CORMORANTS. 



279 



on the rocks near Cape Town as at times to darken the air when on the wing. 

 Such companies continue together during the breeding-season, and may make 

 their nests either in the neighbourhood of swamps, or on ledges of rock. In 

 Burma Mr. Gates describes vast flocks of the common species breeding on low 

 trees at a height of from fifteen to twenty feet above the water on the 

 margin of a swamp; and Mr. Doig records another similar breeding-place in 

 India. In the latter instance "the nests were large platforms of sticks, about 

 two feet in diameter one w^ay and two and a half feet the other ; that is, they 

 were more oval than circular. The eggs were laid on a thin bedding of rush and 

 grass, and the greatest 

 number in one nest was 

 seven. Some had only 

 three, others four, five, 

 and six ; the latter 

 seeming to be the normal 

 number, although some 

 nests had only four 

 young ones." That this 

 breeding - place was a 

 very ancient one, was 

 evident by the circum- 

 stance of the nests being 

 built on the top of those 

 of previous years. The 

 eggs have a very pale blue 

 shell, much encrusted 

 with chalky matter, and 

 become very dirty dur- 

 ing the process of incub- 

 ation. In Kerguelen's 

 Land Moseley states 

 that the warty cor- 

 morant (P. verrucosits) 

 breeds in companies on the ledges of the cliffs sloping down to the sea. They 

 make a neat, compact, round nest, raised about a foot from the ground, and 

 composed of mud, with a lining of grass. The number of eggs in this place was 

 only two to three in a nest. He also says that the young birds, with their coat 

 of black down, were exceedingly ugly ; and that " when there are three in the nest 

 nearly full-fledged they form an absurd sight, since the nest is then not big 

 enough to hold more than one properly, so the greater part of the bodies of the 

 three young projects out ; and then, to crown the absurdity, the mother comes and 

 sits on the top of these three young as big as herself." The young feed themselves 

 by poking their heads far down into their parents' throats, and extracting the 

 half -digested fish from their stomachs. Although often roosting on rocks, in some 

 places cormorants spend -the night in trees; and on some parts of the Nile in 

 Egypt they congregate at night by hundreds in the palm-trees fringing its banks. 



CORMORANTS FEEDING THEIR YOUNG. 



(From Sclater, Proc. Zvol. Soc, 1882. 



