Cormorants gang up to kill 30lb Carp (1 Viewer)

[GYBirder23]

Professional Angler Martin Bowler, has reported that another angler saw 3 Cormorants dive down and kill a 30lb Mirror Carp in a UK fishery.

Unusual?

 

[Ppedro]

I would not only think unusual, i would suggest totally untrue.

 

[GYBirder23]

If u are on facebook go to the martin Bowler site all pics are there

 

[Ppedro]

I can't see how 3 Cormorants could do that to a healthy fish, surely it was already in trouble. Some of the less emotional comments on the facebook page suggest other possibilities as well. Must be a few genuine impartial anglers / birders on here, be good to hear their views. Thanks for flagging it up GY.

 

[JoeRawles]

Interesting to read the comments on his FB page - though they expectedly seem to come mainly from anglers' perspectives - 'shoot the cormorants' etc. Can't say I know enough about their behaviour to say whether it's possible or not, but the suggestion of the fish being unwell in the first place seems the most likely. I'm just beginning to get a bit fed up with people decided what animals should be allowed on this planet and what shouldn't be.

 

[Nightranger]

Professional Angler Martin Bowler, has reported that another angler saw 3 Cormorants dive down and kill a 30lb Mirror Carp in a UK fishery.

Unusual?

None of this makes any sense if you really think about it. For example, what would be the motivation of the cormorants? They eat fish whole and a 30-pounder is not going to go down anywhichway yet they cannot tear prey so they cannot have been looking for a meal. In addition, a 30 -pound carp would likely outweigh the three birds put together so it is difficult to see what they could gain even if the alleged attack was motivated by something else. It seems likely that the killer was mammalian but I have my doubts about the ones on FB that suggest otter. Some of the wounds look to have been caused post mortem so they could have been cormorant or heron but the main wound is more likely have been caused by a mink.

 

[scuba0095]

mink or an otter but the otter would have eaten it the mink may have tried to kill it but the fish got away

I dont believe it either cormorants do not act like a pack of dogs lol

Unless there is proof of them eating large dead animals I can't beleive it

I could see gulls doing it if they had the ability to dive like that

 

[chris butterworth]

IMO another attempt by certain anglers to get permission to shoot any, and all, Cormorants they see. Cormorants can be trained to drive fish but they do not tear at their prey. This 'tearing' at prey sounds very like the Victorian idea of "If it's got a hooked beak it must be a predator" which ended up with birds like Nightjar hanging on gatekeepers gibbets. A 30 lb Carp is the size of a medium sized piglet and no Cormorant ( or 3 ) is going to waste energy attempting to catch something that size - even a White-tailed Eagle would balk at something that size. This, I'm afraid, must go in the bin alongside Pigeon racers claims of "flocks of Peregrines lining the fences waiting for the birds to be let out", WW2 bombers on the Moon and Elvis working in our chipshop.

Chris

 

[abi107]

And here is the fish getting their revenge on the birds:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZwPG_x6QEk

 

[Gill Osborne]

Fisherman have ALWAYS over-exaggerated the size of the fish

It'll have been a stickleback :-O

 

[eddy the eagle]

As a carp fisher and an ardent birder I can definitely say that 3 cormorants cannot catch and kill a 30lb carp,unless it is almost dead in the first place.I have seen a grey heron catch a carp of approx. 7lbs and then spend the next half hour trying to swallow it with great difficulty.Otters are the biggest predators of large carp and have been credited with catching and killing carp 40lb+ and they can hunt in small packs.IMHO this attack looks like the work of otters until presented with further facts.....Eddy