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Fun Facts
Did You Know?
The double-crested cormorant is a member of the family Phalacrocoracidae — a group of large aquatic birds with a fossil record going back roughly 30 million years. That means cormorants were standing on logs with their wings spread open approximately 29.9 million years before anyone had opinions about it. They are found on every continent except Antarctica, doing exactly what they do now, and the concept of improving their image has simply never come up. The cormorant does not have a PR team. The cormorant finds the suggestion slightly offensive and is going to go catch a fish now
If This Animal Could Talk...
"Watch closely, respect my space, and let my habitat explain the rest of the story."
Double-Crested Cormorant:Double-Crested Cormorant
If you've spent any time on a North Louisiana lake between October and April and noticed a large, dark, prehistoric-looking bird standing on a log with its wings spread wide like it's auditioning for a role in a movie about the end of the world, you've met the double-crested cormorant. Phalacrocorax auritus is not subtle, not apologetic, and not particularly concerned about your opinions of its lifestyle choices. It has been blamed for eating all the fish, ruining perfectly good trees, generating a smell at close range that raises questions about existence, and — perhaps most impressively — being personally impersonated by Satan in a seventeenth-century epic poem. And through all of it, the cormorant has continued to stand on its log, wings spread, completely unbothered, drying its feathers in the pale winter sun with the serene indifference of something that has been here longer than the argument and will be here when the argument is over.
A Few More Facts
How they hunt and forage: Cormorants are pursuit divers — they enter from the surface and chase prey underwater using their large webbed feet as propulsion. Cormorants eat roughly a pound of fish per day, and a wintering flock of several hundred birds doing that math together on the same lake every day for six months produces a number that sounds alarming at a boat ramp. The cormorant is just out here trying to eat fish and dry off.
Live birth or eggs? no
When young are born: The youngest eats when the oldest is full, which in a lean fishing year may not reliably occur.
Photo Gallery
What Is the Double-Crested Cormorant Often Confused With?
The cormorant is a large, dark, long-necked waterbird with a hooked bill and an expression that suggests it has been asked the same question too many times already. Adults are mostly black overall with a somewhat oily iridescent sheen in good light. The bare skin at the throat and base of the bill is warm orange-yellow — that bright patch against all that dark feathering is a useful field mark visible from a reasonable distance once you know to look for it. The eyes are brilliant emerald green, a detail most people miss because they aren't expecting it, and which is genuinely startling the first time you notice it. The bird is wearing expensive contacts and is not interested in discussing them. Immature birds are brown rather than black, with pale buffy undersides that darken gradually over two to three years of molt cycles. Young cormorants have a messier, more uncertain appearance than adults and can cause confusion with other dark waterbirds when you're not prepared for a juvenile. Give it time.
Drag the handle left and right to compare Double-Crested Cormorant side by side with the species it gets mistaken for most.
Double-Crested Cormorant vs. American Coot
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Accessibility
Accessibility
Double-crested cormorants are among the most accessible wildlife subjects in North Louisiana during winter because they congregate in visible, predictable locations and tolerate vehicle-based observation extremely well. The dead roost trees that concentrate birds are visible from across a lake and identifiable from the road, making this one of the few wildlife species where you can locate a productive observation site before leaving the car.
Black Bayou Lake NWR near Monroe has paved accessible paths and boardwalk sections that put visitors over the water at cormorant level — close enough to watch the diving sequence without any walking on uneven terrain. The observation platforms at the refuge are among the most reliable accessible cormorant viewing spots in the region, and winter visits produce sightings of both the birds and the diving behavior that distinguishes them from every other waterbird on the lake.
For vehicle-based observation, Lake D'Arbonne's access roads and boat launch areas allow viewing from the car through winter. Poverty Point Reservoir in Richland Parish is compact enough to cover without extensive walking and holds reliable winter cormorant populations.
For visitors who are blind or have low vision: cormorant colonies are acoustically distinct, particularly at dawn and dusk when social activity peaks. The colony vocalization — persistent grunting, croaking, and cackle sequences from multiple birds — identifies the roost site from considerable distance. The sound of the colony carries across water in calm conditions. The wing-drying posture is an extended, stationary behavior that makes individual birds easier to locate and track once the colony site is found.
The splashing entry and re-emergence sequence of diving birds is audible at close range from an accessible boardwalk or shoreline position.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Does Double-Crested Cormorant live in North Louisiana?
Yes. If you've spent any time on a North Louisiana lake between October and April and noticed a large, dark, prehistoric-looking bird standing on a log with its wings spread wide like it's auditioning for a role in a movie about the end of the world, you've met the double-crested cormorant. In North Louisiana, double-crested cormorants are primarily winter birds, arriving in fall as their northern breeding grounds become inhospitable and departing in spring to go make other lakes smell terrible somewhere in Canada.
If you see a line of large dark birds flying fast and low over a North Louisiana lake in November, neck crooks visible, heading somewhere specific, those are your cormorants.
How do you identify Double-Crested Cormorant?
The cormorant is a large, dark, long-necked waterbird with a hooked bill and an expression that suggests it has been asked the same question too many times already. Adults are mostly black overall with a somewhat oily iridescent sheen in good light. The bare skin at the throat and base of the bill is warm orange-yellow — that bright patch against all that dark feathering is a useful field mark visible from a reasonable distance once you know to look for it. The eyes are brilliant emerald green, a detail most people miss because they aren't expecting it, and which is genuinely startling the first time you notice it. The bird is wearing expensive contacts and is not interested in discussing them. Immature birds are brown rather than black, with pale buffy undersides that darken gradually over two to three years of molt cycles. Young cormorants have a messier, more uncertain appearance than adults and can cause confusion with other dark waterbirds when you're not prepared for a juvenile. Give it time.
What does Double-Crested Cormorant eat?
Cormorants are pursuit divers — they enter from the surface and chase prey underwater using their large webbed feet as propulsion. Cormorants eat roughly a pound of fish per day, and a wintering flock of several hundred birds doing that math together on the same lake every day for six months produces a number that sounds alarming at a boat ramp. The cormorant is just out here trying to eat fish and dry off
Is Double-Crested Cormorant dangerous to people?
Cormorants and Humans: A Long and Complicated History
Back in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, cormorants were blamed for wreaking havoc on fisheries, and some folks found them rather creepy — a large, dark bird that dove underwater and came up with fish and stared at you from a dead tree had a way of making an impression. They faced the wrath of guns. They were written into epic poetry as the chosen form of the devil himself. They have been, historically speaking, one of the most comprehensively disliked birds in the English-speaking world, which is a real achievement for something that just wants to eat fish.
The cormorant's checkered reputation with humans isn't entirely unfair and isn't entirely deserved. They do eat a lot of fish. They do kill trees. They do smell like something that should be renamed. But they also serve as indicators of healthy water systems, help control overpopulated rough fish species, and have managed to coexist with human fishing cultures on six continents for the entire history of human fishing. Everything in nature has its balance, and cormorants are part of maintaining it in the fishy world — even if they go about it in the most aggressively off-putting way possible.
The cormorant is not evil. The cormorant is not the devil. The cormorant has been framed, repeatedly and enthusiastically, and it has survived every attempt to write it out of the landscape. It is still here. It will still be here. It is watching you from the dead tree and it would like you to know it has no further comment.
