THE CORMORANT. 165 
Mayo); in high trees near the sea, or even far from the coast, generally near well 
stocked rivers and lakes. Mr. H. Seebohm mentions an interesting colony of 
Cormorants on trees, which he saw on an island in Lough Cooter, near Gort, in the 
south of Galway. It was ten miles from the sea, and there were fifty nests built on 
lofty trees. If there be no rocks or high trees, or the country be flat, in a locality 
which they have selected as suitable, they will place their nest on the ground, in 
pollard willows, in low bushes, or even in swamp tussocks “just above the surface 
of the water,” as Sir Walter Buller has recorded of them in New Zealand. Dr. 
Sclater and the late Mr. W. A. Forbes found them in Hoorster Mere, in Holland, 
building on a circular space, perhaps fifty yards in diameter, cleared of reeds, in 
which the Cormorants nests stood thick together on the swampy soil. ‘The Cor- 
morant, which invariably nests in communities, forms, when it builds by the sea, its 
nest of sea-weed, from one to two feet in height, only slightly hollowed out, and 
lined with any green leaves it can collect in the vicinity. When these birds build 
on the ground or on trees in inland situations, the structure consists of piles of 
sticks, and reeds, with green grass, often added to, from year to year, till it attains 
to several feet in height. Extensive areas or patches, on and beneath the rocks, 
of greenish-white excrement, (fatal to all vegetation coming in contact with it), 
and its disgusting odour, mingled with that of the decaying regurgitated fragments 
of fish, that exclusively forms their food, invariably localise the site of a Cor- 
morant rookery. 
The date of their nesting varies somewhat with the season, but as a rule they. 
begin to build, or patch their old dwellings, during April, and have finished laying 
generally by the end of May, or before the middle of June, at latest. The eggs, 
elongated-oval in shape, and numbering from four to six, are white, rough, and 
of a soft chalky consistency, with a pale greenish-blue underground, which can be 
seen only when the eggs are newly laid, and before they become covered, as they very 
soon do, with excrement and dirt. Both parents take a turn at sitting, which lasts 
for a lunar month. If the nest of a pair be robbed, they will occasionally replenish 
their home by stealing a ‘“‘sitting,” from the unguarded nests of their neighbours. 
But woe betide them if they are caught! The young squabs, which are hatched 
with sealed eyelids, have bluish-black naked bodies, brown feet, and horn coloured 
beaks. ‘The birds then assume separate duties. The female covers and protects her 
brood : while the male fetches food both for his mate and the young, each of whom 
in turn thrusting its head right down into his gullet, seizes the half digested 
morsels as he disgorges them. 
After their first moult, the young Cormorants are brownish-black, slightly 
washed with green above, and dirty-white beneath, with flesh-coloured bills 
Vor. UI 2C 
