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Double-Crested Cormorant — Part 2
Images coming soon.
In some parts of the United States, but chiefly in the Bay of Fundy and beyond, the double-crested cormorants retire to nest in large companies on the ledges of cliffs along the sea, or in low bushes or bushy trees inland. The nest consists of a mass of sticks and sea-weed, and both it and its vicinity look as if they had been spattered over with whitewash, owing to the bird's unclean habits. When the four or six eggs are first laid, they are covered over with a rough, chalky deposit that is easily rubbed off, showing a bluish-green shell beneath. The young, that are hatched blind, have not even down to cover their inky-black skin. It takes fully two years to perfect the beautiful iridescent black plumage worn by adults. For a time the nestlings are fed with food brought up from their parents' stomachs; and so active is the cormorant's digestion that a fish caught by one is said to have reached a stage fit for baby food between the time the bird catches it in the water and transports it in its stomach to its adjacent nest. On shore these birds rest in an almost upright position, because their legs are set far back on their bodies, which also necessitates using the stiff tail as a prop. Doubtless this tail, that is used also as a rudder or paddle, adds to the cormorant's extraordinary facility in swimming under water.
LAMELLIROSTRAL, OR PLATE-BILLED SWIMMERS
Mergansers, or Fishing Ducks
River and Pond Ducks
Sea and Bay Ducks
Geese
Swans
LAMELLIROSTRAL, OR PLATE-BILLED SWIMMERS
(Order Anseres)
MERGANSERS; RIVER AND POND DUCKS; SEA AND BAY DUCKS; GEESE; SWANS
(Family Anatidoe)
Five subfamilies, numbering about two hundred species, constitute this large family of water fowl that in itself forms a well-defined order. They are the mergansers, river ducks, sea ducks, geese, and swans. All these birds have the margins of the beak (rostrum) furnished with lamels, or plates, tooth-like projections, fluted ridges or gutters along its sides; but the subfamilies are so well defined that their peculiarities would best be noted separately.