Photo Study: Double-crested Cormorants

The Double-crested Cormorant is a well-known and common species throughout much of the United States. Because of how common they are, I feel like they get ignored often by birders. In fact, I do it myself all the time when I am out birding – scanning out over a lake, I focus on trying to pick out the interesting waterfowl and typically scan right over the cormorants. However, every once and a while cormorants amaze me. For instance, back in October when I took a birding trip down to Cape May. The entire weekend, migrant cormorants were on the move. Everywhere we stopped to bird, if you looked out at the horizon there was bound to be huge lines of hundreds of cormorants passing by, as they traveled southward. Seeing so many cormorants that weekend really made me appreciate them more and realize how beautiful and unique these otherwise quite strange and awkward birds are. Here in central Pennsylvania, we are beginning to see the last Double-crested Cormorants for the year. Soon, almost all of the area’s cormorants will have moved south and won’t be back until mid-March. For this photo study, I wanted to celebrate this common species through a few photos I have taken recently, I hope you enjoy them!

Double-crested Cormorant – adult (Photo by Alex Lamoreaux)

Double-crested Cormorant – juvenile (Photo by Alex Lamoreaux)

Double-crested Cormorant – juvenile (Photo by Alex Lamoreaux)