We went back to the colonies recently to ring more of the tree nesting Cormorants & Little Egrets. On our last trip we found an accessible Herons nest with chicks to small to ring so were hopeful they'd be big enough on our return.
All the cormorants are colour ringed with an orange darvic - we use green darvics on Puffin Island. It was interesting to compare the two colonies. The ones on Puffin are cliff nesting so we can ring quite well developed young whereas with the tree nesting ones they ring slightly smaller chicks as they don't want to risk the bigger ones jumping out the nests prematurely!
The weather was hot and humid, following the thunder storms the previous night, and the smell of ammonia form the guano was all pervading and blocked out any thing else! The arm moist air meant the Horseflies were out in force - wearing waterproof trousers and a long sleeved top was akin to some kind of medieval torture. I certainly sweated off some weight!
Young cormorants squirt poo incredible distances and walking beneath the trees definitely required a hat! They also regurgitate semi-digested fish over you and it was interesting to note that number of the fish were freshwater species - despite the colonies proximity to the Mersey estuary. We definitely found at least one Perch!
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| Darvic ringed cormorants from a previous trip. |
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| Paul fitting a darvic by opening it up until the two edges touch and then slipping it over the foot & 'clicking' shut. We went back to a few Little Egrets where, again, the young were to small to ring last week but should have been a good size. One nest was unfortunately predated. Little Egrets have the same projectile poo and regurgitating habits as Cormorants and it appears their diet consists mainly of shrimps! |
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| Brood of Little Egrets ready for ringing |
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