Sometimes the same species is called a cormorant in one part of the world and a shag in another, e.g., the great cormorant is called the black shag in New Zealand (the birds found in Australasia have a crest that is absent in European members of the species). As other species were encountered by English-speaking sailors and explorers elsewhere in the world, some were called cormorants and some shags, depending on whether they had crests or not. 'Shag' refers to the bird's crest, which the British forms of the great cormorant lack. The names 'cormorant' and 'shag' were originally the common names of the two species of the family found in Great Britain, Phalacrocorax carbo (now referred to by ornithologists as the great cormorant) and Gulosus aristotelis (the European shag). No consistent distinction exists between cormorants and shags. They range around the world, except for the central Pacific islands. The original ancestor of cormorants seems to have been a fresh-water bird. They are coastal rather than oceanic birds, and some have colonised inland waters. Ĭormorants nest in colonies around the shore, on trees, islets or cliffs. They have relatively short wings due to their need for economical movement underwater, and consequently have the highest flight costs of any flying bird. They are excellent divers, and under water they propel themselves with their feet with help from their wings some cormorant species have been found to dive as deep as 45 metres (150 ft). All species are fish-eaters, catching the prey by diving from the surface. Their feet have webbing between all four toes. The majority of species have dark feathers. The great cormorant ( Phalacrocorax carbo) and the common shag ( Gulosus aristotelis) are the only two species of the family commonly encountered in Britain and Ireland and 'cormorant' and 'shag' appellations have been later assigned to different species in the family somewhat haphazardly.Ĭormorants and shags are medium-to-large birds, with body weight in the range of 0.35–5 kilograms (0.77–11.02 lb) and wing span of 60–100 centimetres (24–39 in). Several different classifications of the family have been proposed, but in 2021 the IOC adopted a consensus taxonomy of seven genera. Phalacrocoracidae is a family of approximately 40 species of aquatic birds commonly known as cormorants and shags. Hydrocorax Vieillot, 1819 ( non Brisson, 1760: preoccupied)

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