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Volume V 
November-December, 1903 
Number O 
Notes on the Mexican Cormorant 
BY E. W. NKESON 
A mong the rugged cliffs and headlands of the Aleutian Islands I first saw 
cormorants in sufficient numbers to become familiar with their habits. The 
impression made at this time by the birds and their surroundings was so 
lasting that ever since their presence in a locality creates a sense of strange wild- 
ness that adds a peculiar charm to their haunts. Some of the species, however, 
live in situations quite different from the rude storm beaten crags overlooking 
northern seas where so many^i them congregate. 
The Mexican cormorant {Phalacrocorax inexicanus) is one of these dwellers 
amid milder surroundings. It is a wide ranging species wandering up the Missis- 
sippi Valley to southern Illinois and is found thence south to Central America, and 
even known to Cuba and Watling’s Island in the Bahamas. In the intermediate 
area on the mainland they occur mainly along the coast lagoons from Texas south 
on the gulf coast, and from southern Sonora on the Pacific side of Mexico. From 
the lagoons they range up the larger rivers well into the interior. During our 
work in Mexico Mr. Goldman and I have become most familiar with them in the 
tropical and subtropical parts of the southwestern section of that country. Al- 
though they are found in the coast lagoons north to southern Sonora they are most 
abundant in these situations from Sinaloa southward. We saw them on the Balsas 
River and its tributaries in the heart of Michoacan and Guerrero, and they follow 
the Rio Santiago up through Jalisco to Lake Chapala, at 5000 feet altitude, on the 
southwestern border of the Mexican tableland. 
From the distribution given, it is apparent that this is mainly a fresh or 
brackish water species in its mainland distribution, and Gundlach states that the 
few he saw in Cuba were found about fresh water. 
