Animalia Life

Phalacrocorax penicillatus
TAXONOMY
Carbo penicillatus Brandt, 1837, no locality. Monotypic.
OTHER COMMON NAMES
English: Brown’s cormorant, Townsend’s cormorant; French: Cormoran de Brandt; German: Pinselscharbe; Spanish: Cormorбn Sargento.
PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS
Body length of 29 in (74 cm), with a grayish bill, blue cheek pouch, yellow throat patch, glossy blackish plumage, and black legs and feet.
DISTRIBUTION
Occurs along the Pacific coast of North America, from southern Alaska to Baja California.
HABITAT
Nests in trees and feeds in coastal waters.
BEHAVIOR
A social species that breeds in colonies and aggregates in flocks.
FEEDING ECOLOGY AND DIET
Feeds on small fish, squid, and crustaceans.
REPRODUCTIVE BIOLOGY
Lays three to four eggs in a crude stick-nest, with both sexes sharing the incubation and rearing of the chick. One or two chicks per nest normally fledge.
CONSERVATION STATUS
Not threatened. Abundant over much of its range.
SIGNIFICANCE TO HUMANS
None known.

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