Family PHALACROCORACIDÆ. Bill long and heavy; basal portion of culmen slightly concave, tip strongly decurved and hooked; neck rather long; wings ample but not reaching beyond base of tail, the latter rather long, its feathers graduated and stiff; plumage largely black, at times partly white. Genus PHALACROCORAX Brisson, 1760. Characters same as those given for the Family. 166. PHALACROCORAX CARBO (Linnæus). COMMON CORMORANT. Pelecanus carbo Linnæus, Syst. Nat. ed. 10 (1758), 1, 133. Phalacrocorax carbo Grant, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus. (1898), 26, 340, text fig. 1; Oates, Cat. Birds' Eggs (1902), 2, 198; Sharpe, Hand-List (1899), 1, 232; McGregor and Worcester, Hand-List (1906), 39. Ca-sí-li, Manila, also applied to the darter. Calayan (McGregor); Luzon (McGregor); Ticao (McGregor). Europe, Africa, northern Asia, Greenland; eastern North America south to Georgia; Indian Peninsula to China and Australia. Adult in breeding plumage.--Almost entirely black, with a slight oil-green gloss on neck and under parts; chin dirty white, this color continued backward and upward on each side of neck to back of eye, forming a border, 20 mm. wide, to the gular pouch and naked skin below eye; entire crown, nape, neck on all sides, and throat decorated with long, narrow, soft, white plumes which hide most of the short black feathers; crest glossy black, narrow and about 40 mm. long; each flank decorated with a large patch of long, soft, white feathers; upper back, scapulars, and wing-coverts dull bronze-brown, each feather widely bordered with dark bluish green or with glossy black; quills brownish black; secondaries washed with greenish; tail and its coverts black. Grant gives the following colors and measurements: "Iris bright emerald-green; naked skin round eye greenish brown; below the eye and on gular sack lemon-yellow; bill grayish brown; dusky along culmen and yellowish white toward base; legs and feet blackish. Length, about 914; culmen, 58 to 81; wing, 317 to 356; tail, 173 to 183; tarsus, 58 to 72." Adult in non-breeding plumage.--Similar to the above but without the elongated feathers on head, neck, throat, and flanks. "Young when first hatched are blind and covered with purplish black skin; in the course of a few days they acquire a thick covering of blackish down. "Young in first plumage (September).--General color above dull brown, somewhat glossed on head, neck, and back with bluish green; feathers of back, scapulars, and wing-coverts with wide dark margins; throat, front of neck, breast and belly white; sides, flanks, thighs, and under tail-coverts dark brownish black. As age advances the fore part of neck and chest become brown.