Each winter lakes Sinclair and Lake Oconee receive visits from small populations of the double-crested cormorant. You may have seen some of the mostly black birds swimming in the lake and then disappearing under water for what seems like several minutes before resurfacing some distance away

Description:

This medium-sized bronze brown cormorant is scalloped in black on the upper plumage, lacks a crest and has a small and slightly peaked head with a long narrow bill that ends in a hooked tip. The eye is blue and bare yellow facial skin during the non-breeding season. Cormorants are often sighted fishing in the morning at a pond .The challenge in getting a good picture of them .As these birds dive into the water to catch their prey in the water ,you never quite know where they might surface from .Once they reappear within the seconds, they toss their catch in the air and gulp in down in one fell swoop.

Habitat and distribution:

Cormorant’s feathers are not waterproof. That allows them to dive quickly but also requires that their feathers be dried out periodically. Often you will see them sitting in trees drying their wings in the sun. This cormorant fishes gregariously in inland rivers or large wetlands of peninsular India and northern part of Sri Lanka. It also occurs in estuaries and mangroves but not on the open coast. They breed very locally in mixed species breeding colonies. They extend north-east to Assam and eastward into Thailand, Burma and Cambodia.

Behaviour:

In northern area, they breed from July to February and in Sri Lanka, between November and February. The nests are placed in close proximity to those of other cormorants, storks or waterbirds in dense colonies, often with several tiers of nests. The usual clutch is three to five eggs which are bluish green and with a chalky surface

Photographed with a #Nikon #D5 and the AF-S #NIKKOR 600mm f/4E