The Double Crested Cormorant is the most numerous and widespread North American Cormorant.
It's also the only one that occurs in large numbers inland as well as on the coast.
Growing in numbers throughout its range, this cormorant is incrwasingly being blamed for declines in sport fisheries and for devastating fish farms.
Cool Facts:
The Double Crested Cormorant makes a bulky nest of sticks and other materials. It frequently picks up junk such as rope, deflated balloons, fishnet, and plastic debris to incorporate into the nest. Parts of dead birds are commonly used too. Large pebbles are occaisionally found in cormorant nests, and the cormorants treat them as eggs. Double Crested Cormorant nests often are exposed to direct sun. Adults shade the chicks and also bring them water, pouring it from their mouths into those of the chicks. In breeding colonies where the nests are placed on the ground, young cormorants leave their nests and congregate into groups with other youngsters (creches). They return to their own nests to be fed. Accumulated fecal matter beloe nests can kill the nest trees. When this happens, the cormorants may move to a new area or they may simply shift to nesting on the ground.
Habitat:
Found in diverse aquatic habitats such as ponds, lakes, rivers, lagoons, estuaries and open coastline, more widespread in winter.
Food:
Predominantly fish. Also, some other aquatic animals, insects and amphibians.
Nesting:
Large, often flat nest of sticks and other bulky items, including seaweed and flotsam. Lined with grass or similar material. Placed in trees, on ground or on cliffs. Nests in colonies.
Behavior:
Dives from the surface of the water and chases prey underwater. Grabs fish in bill, without spearing it.
Conservation:
Cormorant populations greatly decreased in the 19th and early 20th centuries from human persecution. They recovered after the 1920s, with an interruption in the recovery during the pesticide era of the 1950s and 1960s. he National Audubon Society considered it a species of special concern in 1972. Increases after the 1970s were explosive in some areas. Increasing cormorant populations have caused conflicts with people. Cormorants have been suggested as playing an important role in the collapse of some fisheries, although data to support these claims are sparse. Cormorants eat fish at fish farms, and recent legislation has been proposed to control cormorant numbers.
Be sure to stop by the Cormorant Habitat and see our Cormorants on your next visit
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