LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN PETRELS AND PELICANS. 259 



but in that bay and in Hassler's Cove, on tlie island, fisli were found very 

 plentiful, and always hungry, showing that the birds do not seriously lessen 

 the number of fish. 



Eeferring to the early morning flight witnessed at this island, he 

 writes : 



From the hills there poured a steady stream of cormorants, flying about 

 eight or ten abreast. This stream poured from these hills continuously and 

 reached as far as we could see, toward the bay of San Quentin. The stream 

 was like a great black ribbon that waved in the breeze and reached to the 

 horizon. It was truly a wonderful sight. The birds kept coming as though 

 there were no limit to their numbers. 



At about seven-thirty a stream began to return, each individual heavily 

 laden with fish. The ribbon of birds was now double — one part leaving and 

 the other returning. The flow of birds was continuous during the daylight 

 hours of each day we were there. The flow was unbroken — simply one steady 

 stream going, all day, and a steady stream returning. 



A colony found by ^r. Joseph Grinnell (1908) on an island in 

 Salton Sea was evidently much like inland lake colonies of the 

 eastern subspecies. He says of it: 



A census of cormorant's nests showed 147 containing eggs, besides many 

 others partly built. The nests were tall, compact structures composed alto- 

 gether of angular shrub-trunks, and lined with mesquite barkstrips and old 

 feathers. The outer basal sticks and the surrounding rocks were all white- 

 washed with excrement. A typical nest was 414 mm high and 552 mm across, 

 slightly saucered. The tendency seemed to be to locate the nests on prominent 

 rock ledges or pinnacles. The number of eggs in a nest ranged from one to 

 six, commonly four or five. 



Several writers report inland colonies nesting in trees. One of 

 the most interesting of these is described by Mr. Corydon Cham- 

 berlain (1895) as follows: 



Early In March of the present year I visited Lakeport (California), a small 

 town on the west shore of Beautiful Clear Lake in Lake County. Big Valley 

 lying on the south side of the upper basin of the lake is a forest of large white 

 oaks. The trees extend down toward the lake as far as the moist soil will 

 support them. Some trees standing within a hundred yards of the low water 

 mark are wholly or partially dead, as though the unfavorable moisture of the 

 soil had early completed the work of senile decay. In such a place where they 

 were within easy reach of their feeding grounds, the cormorants occupied a 

 rookery that had been in use many years. 



We landed on a gravelly beach (the only one for several miles) among some 

 willow bushes and poplar trees. A number of cormorants fluttered excitedly 

 from the poplars and flew away in a frightened manner. Under these trees 

 we found pieces of carp which the birds had dropped and the whole place had 

 a vile smelL About two hundred yards beyond us were two trees covered with 

 cormorants. Both of these trees stood apart from the great body of the forest 

 and one of them was dead, only the trunk remaining, and that, though 

 bleached, was charred deeply on one side. The other had some bunches of 

 leaves about the body and a few more trailing from the ends of some branches, 

 but the upper parts were white, seemingly dead, but really covered with the 

 limey excrement of the birds. South of the trees in the edge of the forest 



