CORMORANTS. 
279 
on the rocks near Cape Town as at times to darken the air when on the wing. 
Such companies continue together during the breeding-season, and may make 
their nests either in the neighbourhood of swamps, or on ledges of rock. In 
Burma Mr. Oates describes vast flocks of the common species breeding on low 
trees at a height of from fifteen to twenty feet above the water on the 
margin of a swamp; and Mr. Doig records another similar breeding-place in 
India. In the latter instance “ the nests were large platforms of sticks, about 
two feet in diameter one way and two and a half feet the other; that is, they 
were more oval than circular. The eg^s were laid on a thin bedding of rush and 
grass, and the greatest 
number in one nest was 
seven. Some had only 
three, others four, five, 
and six; the latter 
seeming to be the normal 
number, although some 
nests had only four 
young ones.” That this 
stance of the nests being- 
built on the top of those 
of previous years. The 
eggs have a very pale blue 
.shell, much encrusted 
with chalky matter, and 
become very dirty dur¬ 
ing the process of incub¬ 
ation. In Kerguelen’s 
Land Moseley states 
that the warty cor¬ 
morant (P. verrucosus ) 
breeds in companies on the ledges of the cliffs sloping down to the sea. They 
make a neat, compact, round nest, raised about a foot from the ground, and 
composed of mud, with a lining of grass. The number of eggs in this place was 
only two to three in a nest. He also says that the young birds, with their coat 
of black down, were exceedingly ugly; and that “ when there are three in the nest 
nearly full-fledged they form an absurd sight, since the nest is then not big 
enough to hold more than one properly, so the greater part of the bodies of the 
three young projects out; and then, to crown the absurdity, the mother comes and 
sits on the top of these three young as big as herself.” The young feed themselves 
by poking their heads far down into their parents’ throats, and extracting the 
half-digested fish from their stomachs. Although often roosting on rocks, in some 
places cormorants spend the night in trees; and on some parts of the Nile in 
Egypt they congregate at night by hundreds in the palm-trees fringing its banks. 
breeding - place was a 
very ancient one, was 
evident by the circum- 
CORMORANTS FEEDING THEIR YOUNG. 
(From Sclater, Proc. Zool. Soc., 1882.) 
