^°''i9os' 1 Cole, Observations on the Cormorants. 77 



air, it dexterously caught it, while descending, by the head, and 

 swallowed it with ease. My first experience of these birds 

 eating other than a fish diet was brought about by gold-dredging 

 near Bright, upon the Ovens River and tributaries. This 

 dredging business caused the river water to become very muddy, 

 but when the dredging stopped the river use to clear up in 

 about 48 hours. While the water was dirty no Cormorants 

 would be seen near the river, but upon all the lagoons in the 

 vicinity. Some of the lagoons contained catfish, but others 

 contained no fish life whatever, becoming almost dry in the 

 summer. The house that I occupied in this locality was situated 

 between two lagoons that contained no fish life, but were 

 infested with yabbies {Crustacea), and all day long these two 

 species of birds were to be seen perched upon a stump or log 

 overlooking the water, and every now and then one, diving and 

 bringing one of these Crustacea to the surface, would fly to a log 

 or some convenient spot, and, putting its foot upon its prey, 

 would pull off the tail end, and, swallowing it, resume its 

 fishing in another spot. Upon examining these yabbies I found 

 the head portion and the legs picked clean of all fleshy substance, 

 this being the work of the White-fronted Heron [NotopJioyx 

 novcs-hollandics, Lath.) I have seen one of these birds pick a 

 fish so clean of flesh that the skeleton would have made an 

 osteologist envious. One thing I noticed about these 

 Cormorants is that they nearly always fish in the shallower 

 waters, the weeds, rushes, &c., near the margin of the bank 

 harbouring Crustacea. 



Along the edge of these weeds in the river shoals of small 

 perch of different species come to feed, and the Cormorant 

 fishing overhead suddenly dives in amongst them. When fish 

 are scarce these birds swim along under the water and make a 

 good meal off the well-known fresh-water shrimps that are to be 

 obtained in quantity along the weedy banks of the Ovens River. 

 One evening, while fishing in the Ovens River, I shot a 

 Cormorant on its way to roost, and upon dissecting it found its 

 stomach to contain nothing else but these shrimps, which came 

 in very handy for fishing. An old dodge, upon catching a cod, 

 was to dissect its stomach, if short of bait. I have seen one of 

 these birds upon the Goulburn River dive five times and every 

 time bring up a fish. These two species of Cormorants used to 

 build in colonies, the trees standing in a lagoon or swamp, that 

 always contained water, being selected for their nests. So much 

 for our inland water Cormorants. 



Part II.— Observations along the Coast of Western 



Port Bay. 



Coming now to the coast of the above bay, I find that my two 

 feathered friends, P. vielanoleucus and P. sulcirostris, are still 



