6 
MUSEUM BULLETIN NO. 13. 
obvious reluctance of cormorants to cross land, and in the 
absence of other evidence, we consider that most, if not all, 
the cormorants seen about Gaspe are of the local population 
and not intrusives from other grounds. 
Through the day practically all the cormorants, not brooding 
eggs or young, are found in the estuaries of the river mouths 
emptying into the bay. A few are occasionally seen on the 
waters of the outer harbour but they are only occasional in 
proportion to those regularly seen on the inner basin. Gaspe 
basin is the enlarged mouth of the York river separated from 
the waters of Gaspe bay by a narrow channel, a few hundred 
yards across. Within this narrow mouth it gradually widens to 
over a mile in width where, towards its head, it spreads over 
flat, marshy, island-filled shallow's gradually narrowing to the 
river mouth proper some miles up. These wide tidal areas are 
just awash at low tide. At high tide they are covered by 2 or 
3 feet of water. The bottom is mud well grown with eel grass. 
Along one side of the channel extends a long row of stout piles, 
retaining booms for the guidance of pulp logs, that are floated 
down stream during the freshets. Equally spaced along these 
piles are firm, stone-filled cribs to better withstand the pressure 
of flood and ice. In the morning as soon as the sun is well up the 
cormorants fly in through the narrow channel separating the basin 
from the bay, their numbers increasing until about nine o’clock 
when most of the birds are to be found fishing in the shallow 
water at the head of the basin. On first coming in they alight in 
the water, look about a minute, and then disappear with an easy 
gliding dive. They generally remain under the water for about 
a minute. If they have been successful in their fishing, their 
prey can be easily seen when they reappear. They catch 
a fish crossways and it takes a little manipulation and sundry 
jerks of the head to get it placed properly in th® mouth; then 
there is an upward flirt of the bill and the fish is swallowed. A 
few gulps are given and the bird is ready to repeat the operation. 
When temporarily satisfied, the cormorants betake themselves 
to any near-by floating object or to the boom logs and piles lining 
the way. Sometimes every pile for half a mile or so acts as 
pedestal to an ebony black cormorant posing statuesquely on 
