Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Cormorants: Bye, bye, Birdies?

Haven't seen cormorants in a week. What about other pondmeisters? Have the dirty birds headed north?

Have only seen one all season!!

I still have the electric fence cord over mine

Saw my first water turkey ever here last Fall. I hope he doesn't come back with friends.

So much water from the MS river and rain that they are spread out. A few here and there. They seem to prefer water with small bait fish like shad.

I have twine over my forage pond, seems to have discouraged cormorants (though not geese, but at least geese don't eat fish).

Knock on wood.......none on my pond in the last week.

not a cormorant but I did see a common loon on Texoma last week. I haven't seen one of them since a trip to Minnesota. I guess some spend their winters at Texoma. I notice the cormorants down here in the winter, I presume they head north for nesting like the loons do.

anthropic....it appears the evil is gone and not near as bad this year.



jpsdad we saw a loon on Lake Tawakoni about ten days ago

Only one or two this year, and they all moved along after assessing the situation.

And here I thought all the loons were in D.C.

LOL! You have a way of keeping the comedy up around here. I didn't meet any loonies while I was there but I am sure they have as many as do we. Straight up great people.

That's the first time I'd ever heard the greeting " How the heck are ya?" We were shopping a grocery store in Ely when heard a resident greet a friend with that phrase in the way only a Minnesotan can. My poor wife got the worst case of giggles she'd ever had and just couldn't stop. Every now and again I request my to do an impression as she can do the accent to bring back the memory.

I have seen loons on
most of the lakes I have been to here in e tx. Fact is when you see them on the lake start fishing that area for bass.

I run them off about every day here for the past couple weeks.

“Ran” one off a few days ago.... lol they are bad ju ju. Didn’t have many this winter maybe due to the all winter bloom and low visibility

Tracy, would you say the same about cormorants or are loons different?

Frank, I have always heard bad things about cormorants but never have I ever heard bad things about loons. I know loons feed on shad and that is why lmb are in the area also feeding on shad.

Speaking of shad, have you gotten any yet? I've placed an order, but haven't heard anything.

I checked for shad this spring but they were not available so I am going to try and capture some and transplant them to the pond. I went through a learning curve last fall after capturing some from the cove behind my lakehouse. I discovered it's is not hard to tell the difference in the gizzard versus the threadfin after capturing some of each. I plan on trying it again when I can find a larger-sized round holding tank. I understand if I use my pond water in the transportation tank then it is legal for me to transfer them to the pond.

Still seeing a few singles in our lake near Tyler. The bulk of them left over the last couple of weeks. I have been offering 20 ga encourgement all winter to no avail. The shad die off during the big freeze gave them a buffet.

Ross, I've found only two ways to keep cormorants under control, though neither are perfect. One is to scare away the scouts, the other is to use twine crisscrossed around vulnerable pond areas. At one time I tried giant scare-eye balloons, but they soon got used to them.

Our lake is too big to use twine or such. I run them off the roost at dusk as often at possible, shoot at them, etc. I wish I could afford the Harris hawk crew we used at work to run off the grackles. Those hawks could clear them out and they wouldn't come back.