Cormorants - Fake News?

[Neil Kirk]

I have been mulling this matter over for a while.

In a recent post on social media there was discussion taking place regarding cormorants which broadly split into 2 campsbetween

1) They have no place on our waters, eat all our fish and should be shot

Versus

2) They are a nuisance but humans have created this problem by overfishing the seas and they are an animal doing what comes naturally.

I have to admit that I fall into the latter camp.

Into this discussion stepped an individual who I am not going to name who claimed to be the author of a document (published?) and claimed the following 3 things:

A) There is no shortage of fish in our seas.

B) That cormorants are not naturally coastal birds but freshwater birds.

and most bizarrely

C) The RSPB and other "so called" conservation organisations are actively encouraging the spread of cormorants through British inland waters.

Having questioned myself as to whether I had entered a parallel universe/ Twighlight Zone. I responded by saying that I have been fishing in the sea since I was 7 and there is no doubt in my mind (and in published evidence) that fish stocks around Britain are drastically lower now than they were 50 years ago, that as a child I only ever saw cormorants in coastal areas and their presence in inland waters has, in my experience, occurred relatively recently (in the last 30 years or so) and I also asked him to detail the specific mechanism/s by which the RSPB was "actively encouraging cormorants to spread through our inland waters".

Perhaps unsurprisingly,but also exceedingly frustratingly, the individual concerned did not respond and I have seen no further posts from them.

I am interested to know what other users of BFW think about cormorants on our inland waters (add in goosanders, mergansers and any other fish-eating birds or mammals or even fish if you wish).

 

[Terry Simner]

Well you could say that seagulls are more 'freshwater birds' than cormorants, as there's more seagulls inland than there are cormorants (but that would be ridiculous statement). On the question of shortage of fish in our seas ... fish eating birds will move to wherever the fish are, and so do the factory ships (which aren't crewed by British fishermen)

 

[Joe Winstanley]

T

 

[Joe Winstanley]

The latter camp.

I believe a lot of the densely stocked inland fisheries (commercial fisheries and trout) play a large role in attracting cormorants inland, I've often thought these businesses should have to pay a levy, with the revenue spent on habitat improvements on any rivers found to be impacted by cormorant predation. But, just how much are fish stocks impacted by cormorant predation? As pointed out by 'The Secret Angler' ( Anglers and cormorants – The Secret Angler (home.blog) there hasn't been that much UK specific research on cormorant predation.

Are barbel impacted more than silver fish? It seems to me that silver's are doing much better in many of our rivers in recent years and the grim predictions made by some a decade or so ago that cormorants would completely decimate fish stocks hasn't really happened has it?

Two of the Cheshire meres I know well are currently experiencing a silver fish renaissance. One mere is booming with roach, the other with roach and rudd. Cormorants are regular visitors to both meres and can nearly always be seen on one mere, which is not surprising given the presence of a breeding colony less than 10 miles away as the crow flies. It's far from straightforward.

 

[Ady Brayshaw]

There was an article on the different species of cormorants (with a few myth busters within) published in the Angling Star about 20 years ago. It was a former South Yorkshire angling publication. I don't know whether or not it's still in business. Nonetheless, I could copy and post up here if interested. It was quite informative and busted the myth that they are refugees from the sea.

 

[Josh Porteous-Webster]

I'd be interested to read that @Ady Brayshaw as this side of the discussion often seems to be missing.

 

[Andrew Burt]

I’m in the need be controlled camp. Numbers have increased dramatically and the problem is not just confined to the UK but Europe and other parts of the world. Therefore I don't believe that the arrival inland is simply down to lack of food in UK waters. Even if it were and the spread inland is solely a man made issue it does not mean that man should not try and reverse the problem. I am not in favour of simply trying to scare them from one place to another as this will simply put more pressure on natural venues especially rivers. The numbers need to be controlled and that means shooting them IMO. You only have to look at the change in behaviour over the last 30 years to see how predation has affected the fish, places you could catch all winter devoid after a frost. Aggregating in towns and other small areas a sign of predation issues and if you think it won’t affect barbel I have seen the stomach contents with barbel up to about 2lb. I remember a TV program in the early 90’s in which David Attenborough put a compelling case forward for controlling numbers. If it’s good enough for him.....

 

[Mark Swaby]

We have 1000 cormorants in the Colne valley at the last official count a couple of years ago. If each bird takes 1kilo of fish a day (none of the cormorants I see are the small ) that is 254 tons of fish a year. I run a fishery on the river Colne West London and there a few silvers, to be honest there are few fish under 3lb. I cannot shoot them because I am in a country park, I cannot even scare them. I have them on my fishery all year round but when the lakes and canal freeze over all of them come to the Colne to feed. I did a fishery management course last year and one of my habitat lecturers was a senior RSPB man. In my opinion he saw fish purely as bird food and he ran his RSPB lakes to suit his cause, stunted rudd were his delight. We had an almost total fish kill on one of our 45 acre lakes. I saw thousands of small pike and perch lots of massive fish but only about 30 small Roach. I help out teaching people mostly kids how to fish twice a year at Hillingdons Little Britain lake. Two years ago the kids with me had about 300 small carp all around 8oz,the two lads next to me had around 500 with their kids each day. There were thousands caught round the lake, the Cormorants were feeding all over the lake. Last year only 1 small perch was caught on the whole lake, trying to teach kids how to fish where there were no fish was very difficult. Personally I see areas of the country that have large numbers of Cormorants and areas that have few. Maybe localised culls should be the answer. I am in a National fishery management group and everything to stop cormorant predation has been tried and failed and I mean everything apart from nets over the water. Lots of the habitat answers just seem to concentrate the silvers making them easier to target

 

[Ady Brayshaw]

Attached are two PDF's copy of the one page Angling Star cormorant article published in 2001. I do not know if this would infringe copyright, as the A Star has, as far as I am aware, now ceased production. Andy may feel the need to delete. If so, I offer an unreserved apology.

 

[Neil Kirk]

I certainly wouldn't argue that cormorants don't have any impact on some fisheries. The Walthamstow Reservoir complex used to have plenty of decent roach which it certainly doesn't anymore and there are significant numbers of cormorants which roost on the islands.

If indeed there is a separate species of cormorant which favours fresh water then that could be a very important factor but difficult to verify if they are virtually indistinguishable from the native cormorants.

I am concerned that as a visible and very efficient predator the cormorant ( or otter or goosander) gets blamed for all the problems on a fishery when perhaps there are less obvious problems such as water abstraction, water quality and signal crayfish also having an effect.

The Angling Star article looks interesting but will have to print it off in order to read it properly.

All very interesting.

 

[Ady Brayshaw]

In a few ways, I would wager, that the European Freshwater Cormorant has a more devastating impact on a fishery, due to their numbers, than a naturally bred (not introduced /stocked) otter. They are a fairly big bird with an appetite to match. I once witnessed first hand the stomach contents of 7.5 lb cormorant. That feeding bird (in winter) had 1.5 lb of fish in its stomach. The majority were very small 1 st year roach (they were fresh and undigested). That scaled up with dozens of birds will have a devastating effect on a fishery. I also noticed that the dead bird had a high body temperature. Even though it was winter, snow on the ground, and it had been in the cold water for sometime after being shot.

I still see cormorants. Most days on any river I will normally see at least the one bird. But I get the impression that there are not as many as there were say 10 years ago. Having just said that. I have a video of about a hundred cormorants (5 years ago) attacking a tightly packed shoal of coarse fish on Chew Valley reservoir. Also, a year last September on the tidal Trent, a pack of about 50 cormorants swimming as a huge feeding pack upstream.

They can and do take larger prey, but it's their effect on the youngest year class that I imagine is the most devastating.

 

[Paul Collins]

I once watched one take a rainbow Trout on the East Warwick res. At Walthamstow. The rainbow was at least 3lb possibly bigger.

 

[Joe Winstanley]

In a few ways, I would wager, that the European Freshwater Cormorant has a more devastating impact on a fishery, due to their numbers, than a naturally bred (not introduced /stocked) otter. They are a fairly big bird with an appetite to match. I once witnessed first hand the stomach contents of 7.5 lb cormorant. That feeding bird (in winter) had 1.5 lb of fish in its stomach. The majority were very small 1st year roach (they were fresh and undigested). That scaled up with dozens of birds will have a devastating effect on a fishery. I also noticed that the dead bird had a high body temperature. Even though it was winter, snow on the ground, and it had been in the cold water for sometime after being shot.

I still see cormorants. Most days on any river I will normally see at least the one bird. But I get the impression that there are not as many as there were say 10 years ago. Having just said that. I have a video of about a hundred cormorants (5 years ago) attacking a tightly packed shoal of coarse fish on Chew Valley reservoir. Also, a year last September on the tidal Trent, a pack of about 50 cormorants swimming as a huge feeding pack upstream.

They can and do take larger prey, but it's their effect on the youngest year class that I imagine is the most devastating.

Your impression would appear to be backed up by the BTO's Breeding Bird Survey data. They don't however differentiate between the two sub-species. They note on the BTO website: 'Breeding had been recorded at 89 inland sites by 2012, and the inland population had risen to about 2,130 pairs by 2005 and 2,362 pairs in 2012'. I assume these inland breeders are mostly made up of the sinensis sub-species.

 

[Neil Blood]

This statement is rubbish:

2) They are a nuisance but humans have created this problem by overfishing the seas and they are an animal doing what comes naturally.

There are two subspecies occurring in the UK, which are difficult to tell apart:

• Sinensis - Is the continental subspecies, typically a bird of freshwater, which has spread rapidly across northern Europe in recent years. This is where the UK cormorant problem started.
• Carbo - Is/was typically a coastal bird; however given the arrival of Sinensis, they have also moved inland in recent years, as the two subspecies will cohabit. Both species now breed inland.

If there were no fish in the sea we'd be seeing catastrophic declines in Gannets etc, which we are not.

Regarding:

C) The RSPB and other "so called" conservation organisations are actively encouraging the spread of cormorants through British inland waters.

This is twisted nonsense, remember that the RSPB exist to help both declining bird species and keep common birds common. You don't see the RSPB, going over the top about the current Natural England licencing system, to cull fish eating birds, where they cause a threat to a inland fish stocks. If Cormorants were put on a general licence, then yes I'd expect the RSPB to give cause for concern. The RSPB seems to get a lot of grief from anglers and I'm not entirely sure why, as with out them you'd be relying on utterly useless organisations, like Nature England and Countryside Council for Wales, to protect and enhance your valuable wildlife.

As for my own colours, I'm an angler, twitcher, RSPB member and I've used NE's licencing system to enable others to shoot cormorants.

 

[Joe Winstanley]

Without any question I'm seeing so many more Goosanders in recent years. I'm almost certain if I left the house now and went down to a couple of nearby stretches of the Bollin and Dane I would able to see a goosander or two. That was not the case 5-years ago.

 

[Joe Winstanley]

'The RSPB and other "so called" conservation organisations are actively encouraging the spread of cormorants through British inland waters'

The only element of truth in that statement is that by creating new wetlands, some of which are on a vast scale, and by enhancing the management of existing wetland sites you can argue that they are indirectly encouraging the spread of cormorants.

 

[Neil Blood]

'The RSPB and other "so called" conservation organisations are actively encouraging the spread of cormorants through British inland waters'

The only element of truth in that statement is that by creating new wetlands, some of which are on a vast scale, and by enhancing the management of existing wetland sites you can argue that they are indirectly encouraging the spread of cormorants.

Correct and you can’t expect them to stop creating new habitats, for Bitterns, Bearded Tits, Marsh Harriers etc, just because a few Cormorants may tag along too.

Remember that NE provide a licencing system to deal with fish eating birds; the problem is that most angling clubs are not organised enough to use it. I don’t shoot myself, but I do have licences in my name for two angling clubs. I’ve also advised two other clubs on how to use it.

 

[Neil Blood]

Without any question I'm seeing so many more Goosanders in recent years. I'm almost certain if I left the house now and went down to a couple of nearby stretches of the Bollin and Dane I would able to see a goosander or two. That was not the case 5-years ago.

View attachment 13233

Correct Joe, Goosanders are now breeding throughout the Dane. I’ve seen two broods this year containing 12+ young. Couple this with Cormorant predation and your silver fish soon dry up, as does fry recruitmen. Then your left with a few adult fish, which are open to Otter predation.

it’s no wonder that the Dane Barbel population has crashed so catastrophically

 

[Neil Kirk]

This statement is rubbish:

2) They are a nuisance but humans have created this problem by overfishing the seas and they are an animal doing what comes naturally.

There are two subspecies occurring in the UK, which are difficult to tell apart:

• Sinensis - Is the continental subspecies, typically a bird of freshwater, which has spread rapidly across northern Europe in recent years. This is where the UK cormorant problem started.
• Carbo - Is/was typically a coastal bird; however given the arrival of Sinensis, they have also moved inland in recent years, as the two subspecies will cohabit. Both species now breed inland.

If there were no fish in the sea we'd be seeing catastrophic declines in Gannets etc, which we are not.

Regarding:

C) The RSPB and other "so called" conservation organisations are actively encouraging the spread of cormorants through British inland waters.

This is twisted nonsense, remember that the RSPB exist to help both declining bird species and keep common birds common. You don't see the RSPB, going over the top about the current Natural England licencing system, to cull fish eating birds, where they cause a threat to a inland fish stocks. If Cormorants were put on a general licence, then yes I'd expect the RSPB to give cause for concern. The RSPB seems to get a lot of grief from anglers and I'm not entirely sure why, as with out them you'd be relying on utterly useless organisations, like Nature England and Countryside Council for Wales, to protect and enhance your valuable wildlife.

As for my own colours, I'm an angler, twitcher, RSPB member and I've used NE's licencing system to enable others to shoot cormorants.

Don't hold back Neil!

Up to now everyone has been polite and reasoned rather than just jumping in with both hob nailed boots.

I've already learned some things about cormorants that I didn't know at the start of my post in which I made it clear that I wanted to find out more- you clearly want to tell me!

I think you are mistaken ( note the less aggressive wording) when you say that there is no shortage of fish in the sea. According to the RSPB Gannets are only present in significant numbers in a few places and are on the amber list along with a number of other previously common sea birds. Kittiwakes are on the RSPB red list as a species facing extinction. Lack of food is almost certainly a major factor but I accept that overfishing is not the only possible reason.

I wonder whether you do much sea fishing or know many anglers that do because I would be amazed if you can find any who have not experienced drastically worse catches over the last 40 years. I started out fishing on the east coast around Flamborough Head, it was a key nursery ground for cod and the fishing is now absolutely dismal since factory fishing decimated the stocks. Interestingly one of the biggest gannet populations is in this area at RSPB Bempton so they are clearly feeding on other fish - possibly mackerel or sand eels or maybe they are feeding further afield. I read of a long line fisherman who, having put out a line with a thousand baited hooks caught just 1 small codling. Unsurprisingly, the inshore commercial fisherman of Bridlington, Filey & Scarborough have dwindled to virtually nothing.

As the 2 species of cormorants are "virtually indistinguishable" it would seem difficult to verify any assertions about where they came from or what species make up local populations.

Regarding point C) I agree with you absolutely- it is laughable that the RSPB would or could encourage the spread of cormorants though inland waters.

I would like to think that if we ever met up we could continue a civilised discussion over a beer.

Regards

Neil

 

[Neil Kirk]

This statement is rubbish:

2) They are a nuisance but humans have created this problem by overfishing the seas and they are an animal doing what comes naturally.

There are two subspecies occurring in the UK, which are difficult to tell apart:

• Sinensis - Is the continental subspecies, typically a bird of freshwater, which has spread rapidly across northern Europe in recent years. This is where the UK cormorant problem started.
• Carbo - Is/was typically a coastal bird; however given the arrival of Sinensis, they have also moved inland in recent years, as the two subspecies will cohabit. Both species now breed inland.

If there were no fish in the sea we'd be seeing catastrophic declines in Gannets etc, which we are not.

Regarding:

C) The RSPB and other "so called" conservation organisations are actively encouraging the spread of cormorants through British inland waters.

This is twisted nonsense, remember that the RSPB exist to help both declining bird species and keep common birds common. You don't see the RSPB, going over the top about the current Natural England licencing system, to cull fish eating birds, where they cause a threat to a inland fish stocks. If Cormorants were put on a general licence, then yes I'd expect the RSPB to give cause for concern. The RSPB seems to get a lot of grief from anglers and I'm not entirely sure why, as with out them you'd be relying on utterly useless organisations, like Nature England and Countryside Council for Wales, to protect and enhance your valuable wildlife.

As for my own colours, I'm an angler, twitcher, RSPB member and I've used NE's licencing system to enable others to shoot cormorants.

A bit blunt Neil!

And I think you are mistaken (not the less aggressive wording I have chosen!) about overfishing and the effect on birds. The RSPB has the gannet on its Orange List of endangered species along with a number of other sea birds and the Kittiwake on the Red List. It has identified lack of food as a major issue.

Also I began sea fishing as a kid in the 70's on the east coast near Flamborough Head. Its no coincidence that inshore commercial fishing for fish (not crabs and lobsters) is virtually non-existent in that area now. Flamborough Head was a key nursery ground for cod and overfishing by factory ships killed it. I haven't met a single sea angler who is happy with the state of fish stocks around our coast.

The issue about the numbers of native cormorants and European cormorants is interesting but problematic as it is virtually impossible to tell the difference between them and therefore difficult to verify the make up of local cormorant populations.

It may sometimes be necessary to control some animals but it annoys me when some anglers talk about cormorants as if they are vile beasts with evil intent when actually they are a very efficient predator doing what comes naturally. Fish form a part of ecosystems in which they prey on certain things and in turn get preyed upon by others. Left to themselves ecosystems will find their own balance but all too frequently humans cause imbalances and then we as anglers often don't like the consequences ...unless the consequence happens to be a river with a population of very large barbel. Unfortunately this turns to anger/distress when these barbel die/are killed and there are no barbel coming up through the ranks to replace them.

On the other issues I think we are in agreement and hopefully we could have an interesting discussion over a pint if the opportunity arose.

I am an angler, bird watcher, ex RSPB member and qualified Zoologist.