Of the three cormorants found in the Ballarat district, the little black cormorant is the least known.
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Unlike its common black and white relative, it tends to use larger waters and it is usually found in groups.
Generally dismissed as a black bird, the little black cormorant is actually quite handsome when viewed closely. The attractive edges to the wing feathers are a feature, as well as a stunning green eye. Binoculars will assist in noticing these features.
The name is useful for bird-watchers, because there is another similar but larger bird known as the great cormorant. The little black cormorant is noticeably smaller, but it is slightly larger than the little pied cormorant.
The sexes are alike, with little variation through the year apart from worn plumage being duller.
It's only in the last 10 years or so that the little black cormorant has nested at Lake Wendouree. The nesting population is small, but now appears to be annual.
Its main food is fish, usually whatever is easiest to catch but especially young redfin and carp. Yabbies and other creatures make up smaller amounts of prey.
This species usually hunts communally. When larger shoals of fish are present, flocks of the birds actively follow them along, with birds at the rear continually flying over the main group to start again at the front.
At Lake Wendouree, they sometimes accompany the weed-cutting machines, where they take advantage of any disturbed and disoriented fish.
This species is often seen at Lake Burrumbeet, especially when the lake has been stocked with young fish, or when young redfin or other fishes are numerous.
Sightings of a group of little black cormorants on other waters - including farm dams - are usually an indication that fish are present.
BUZZING BEES
The surprising sound of large numbers of bees in the middle of winter led to the discovery of a flowering sheoak tree with abundant flower catkins. This tree was at Campbelltown, on a bush property containing a small number of drooping sheoak trees.
Sheoak catkins indicate a male tree, with the females producing small rosy-red flowers of very different shape.
The pollen from the catkins blows with the wind, fertilising by chance any female flowers in the vicinity.
The high-protein pollen is sought by bees because it helps to build up the colonies prior to the busy spring season.
Sheoaks do not produce nectar, so it seems that the bees collect the pollen without assisting the sheoak's fertilisation in any way.
NATURE QUERIES ANSWERED
Is this a hakea or a grevillea? It is growing in the middle of the Creswick forest.
D.P., Ballarat East.
Sometimes it can be hard to tell whether a plant is a hakea or a grevillea.
This is bushy needlewood, or Hakea decurrens. Both groups have a variety of flower-shapes. One of the main differences is the fruits, with hakeas having prominent woody "nuts" and grevilleas having flat, card-like discs. Also, not many grevilleas have stiff, needle-like leaves.
Bushy needlewood is the only hakea indigenous to this area. Its seeds are a favourite food of black cockatoos.
We have a few local grevilleas, all of them less than a metre tall. While mostly white, bushy needlewood flowers can be pink - as they are towards Blackwood, where the bushes are more robust than at other places.
- Questions and photos are welcome. Send to Roger Thomas at The Courier, PO Box 21, Ballarat, 3353, or email to rthomas@vic.australis.com.au