THE BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA. 
against all Cormorants during the past few years, this species seems to be 
getting scarce as far as South Australia is concerned. The destruction of 
the Cormorant or Shag,’ as it is often known, is a great shame, carried out 
under the mistaken idea that it is an enemy to manliind, by eating all the 
fish up, but from my experience and observations the Cormorant is one of 
Nature’s ‘ teeth ’ in the ‘ cogwheel ’ of her evenly-balanced machinery ; 
destroy one of the ‘ teeth ’ and the machinery will go wrong. In our gulfs 
and about the isolated islands on the coast I have noted that fish were more 
plentiful just where the Cormorant rookeries were situated ; some would argue 
‘ of course, quite natural ’ for ‘ where the carrion is, there you will also 
find the vulture,’ the inference being that the Cormorant v/as there to eat 
up the fish, but strange to say the Cormorants were there when white man 
first came, and were there for aught w^e know ages previously and the fish 
were always plentiful, but directly the birds were destroyed, the fish gave out, 
which is a natural consequence, as the Cormorants live to a large extent on 
the enemies of the fish, such as squid, crustaceans and other predatory 
agents of the finny tribe. It is a pity that the people do not study the life 
habits of the birds, etc., more than they do instead of judging from 
appearances. The Cormorant will catch fish, but more often than not 
it overtakes and eats those that are weakly and physically unfit for 
reproduction ; this is feasible, as the healthy vigorous fish is more able 
to take care of itself in the water than the Cormorant is to catch it. The 
result is that the birds in eating up the weaklings carry out the survival of 
the fittest, and the breed is kept healthy and strong throughout the ages. 
I have seen the large Black Cormorant in many localities in Australia, but its 
main habitat is the sea coast and the many reefs and islands found in these 
localities. I have seen many of the birds about the mouth of the Port 
Adelaide River, but it is practically non est there now. I have also seen 
these birds at the Murray mouth and on Lakes Alexandxina and Albert in 
South Australia ; they are unmistakable from any other members of the 
family on account of their great size and jet black coloration, there being 
occasionally a little speckling of whitish feathers on the neck, which is not seen 
at a distance. I have seen them at the Reed-beds in South Australia but at 
no great distance from the sea-coast. On the Coorong a few of these 
were seen, but they were extremely wild and wary, and we could not get 
within easy reach of them ; they were generally seen in the water, or flying 
past well out of harm’s way ; in the water they often go in companies of 
twenty or more, diving and swimming about with great ease. I noted 
where they had built their nests in previous years on an island, there being 
plenty of old nests about on the low bushes and on the rocky ground, some 
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