Brandt's Cormorant

[Craig Baumann]

I stopped by the river yesterday morning and saw a Brandt's Cormorant floating peacefully in a small lagoon. I didn't think he saw me, but apparently he did. He took a breath and disappeared from the surface. I counted the seconds before he re-surfaced and it was close to a minute before I saw him again. It was an incredible distance he swam for a medium sized bird and when he ended this free dive he had traveled under waer about 50 yards. I was quite impressed!

Cormorant is not a solitary bird - it lives in groups, flies and hunts with its fellow birds, and the three species that live in the Pacific Northwest are, Pelagic Cormorant, the Double-crested Cormorant, and the Brandt's Cormorant. They are among a small group of birds that live on land, travel through the air and swim for long distances, under the surface of the water.

I have often seen Cormorant under the water near the bottom hunting for fish and other food. while I was scuba diving or freediving,

[FONT=Garamond, Times, Serif]Tschüß! diver gent
Sea Star Scuba


DAN - CORAL - AAUS - PADI - REEF - USAA
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[Fondueset]

I've got a fair amount of u/w footage of those bad boys. Sometimes they seem to think I'm one of them - I've had them swimming 12 inches from my head!

 

[Craig Baumann]

One of my dive buddies returned an email I sent him regarding Cormorants, and wrote the following:

"I have seen them at a depth of 60ft. I was shocked! I remember seeing it off in the distance. I was diving Maury Island Barges (near Tacoma, Washington, USA.) I thought at first it was a seal, because I had seen one there the week before. I turned to my buddy to point it out, turned back and I could clearly see it was a cormorant, flying through the water. I looked at my computer, and I was at 60 feet. I think it could have gone deeper, easily. … " DA

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diver_gent