Throughout most of the year, you can spy many Double Crested Cormorants sitting on their nests high in the Cypress trees in Gatorland’s Breeding Marsh and South Alligator Island. A solidly built, long necked, black bird with orange throat pouch and black webbed feet, the Double Crested Cormorant gets its name from a short tuft of feathers that form over each eye during the breeding season. Like the Anhinga, the Cormorant is a diving bird, catching fish or crustaceans underwater in its long curved bill, and then surfacing to flip the food into its mouth swallowing it whole.

As with the Anhinga, Double Crested Cormorants don’t have well-developed oil glands, and aren’t waterproofed very well, enabling the bird to dive farther and stay underwater longer. They often dry their feathers by perching on a pole or tree limb and stretching their wings out in the sunshine. Japanese fisherman use the Cormorant to catch fish by tying a line to its leg and placing a collar around its neck to prevent the bird from swallowing the fish. After the last catch is made, the fishermen remove the collar, allowing the bird to feed on its own.

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