PHALA CROCOBA CID^ : COBMOBANTS. 



723 



^ 



with light and dark colors, much tinged in places with cannine ; eyes white ; bare space around 

 them blue ; eyelids red ; pouch blackish ; feet black. Plumage dark and much variegated. 

 Head mostly white, tinged with yellow on top, the white extending down the neck as a border- 

 ing of the pouch and somewhat beyond ; rest of neck dark chestnut. Upper pails dusky, each 

 feather pale or whitish-centred, the paler gray color prevailing on the wing-coverts. Prima- 

 ries blackish, their shafts basally white ; secondaries dark, pale-edged ; tail-feathers gray. 

 Lower parts grayish-brown, striped with wliite on the sides ; the lower fore-neck varied with 

 yellow, cliestuut, and blackish. 9 said to lack the chestnut coloring of the neck (?) Length 

 about 4.50 feet ; extent 6.50 feet; wing 2 feet ; bill a foot or more, the gular pouch extending 

 about the same distance along the neck. Tail 7.00, 2 2 -feathered ; tarsus 2.50; middle toe and 

 claw 4.50. The bill and soft parts very variable in color with age or other circumstance. Young 

 lack the special coloration of the neck, which is simply dark brown. At first, covered with 

 whitish down. The feathers of the neck of the adult are peculiarly soft and downy ; there is 

 a slight nuchal crest, with stiff bristly feathers on the forehead, and lengthened acute feathers 

 on the lower foreneck and breast. The brown pelican is exclusively maritime, inhabiting both 

 coasts of America from tropical regions to Carolina and California. It plunges for its prey like 

 a gannet, not scooping it up swimming like the white pelican. Breeds in colonies, indiffer- 

 ently on the ground or on bushes and low trees. Eggs 2-3, white, chalky, elliptical, 3.00 X 

 2.00. 



55. Family PHALACROCORACID.^ : Cormorants. 



Bill about as long as head, stout 

 or slender, more or less nearly terete, 

 always strongly hooked at the end; 

 tomia generally found irregularly 

 jagged, but not truly serrate ; a long, 

 nan-ow, nasal gi'oove, but nostrils 

 obliterated in the adult state; gape 

 reaching below the eyes, which are set in naked skin. 

 Gular pouch small, but forming an evident naked space 

 under the bill and on the throat, variously encroached 

 upon by the feathers. Wings short for the order, stiff 

 and strong, the 2d primary usually longer than the 3d, 

 both these exceeding the 1st. Tail rather long, large, 

 more. or less fan-shaped, of 12-14 very stiff, strong 

 feathers, denuded to the base by extreme shortness of 

 the coverts; thus almost '^ scausorial" in structure, 

 recalling that of a woodpecker or creeper, and used in a 

 similar way, as a support in standing, or an aid in 

 scrambling over rocks and bushes. The body is com- 

 pact and heavy, with a long sinuous neck ; the general 

 configuration, and especially tlie far backward set of the 

 legs, is much like that of pygopodous birds. While other Stegmwpodes can stand with the 

 body more or less nearly approaching a horizontal position, the cormorants are forced into a 

 nearly upright posture, when the tail affords with the feet a tripod of support. They also, like 

 tlie birds just mentioned, dive and swim under water in pursuit of their prey, using their wings 

 fur submarine progression, which is not the case with the other families, excepting Plotid^. 

 In both these families the body is not in the least pneumatic under the skin — quite the reverse 

 of Pelicans and Gannets. 



Among osteological characters, aside from the general figure of the skeleton, a long bony 



Fig. 502. —Knee-joint ot Phalacrocorax 

 bicristatus, nat. size, from nature by Dr. K. 

 W. Sliufeldt. F, femur ; P, patella ; T, tibia ; 

 Fb, abula. 



