Heading north from Cumnor, accross fields of turnips
One for the books
That’s Farmoor reservoir, not the flooded Thames. Yellow turnip leaves in the foreground.
A cormorant caught a big fish, which looked far too big to be swallowed.
But just need to fit the head in the mouth, shake about a bit, and wiggle it down.
Pause for breath on the way down
All done.
More blow by blow / swallow by swallow photos in a separate gallery below.
Cormorant rafts
Greylag and white goose. The white one could be an escaped/liberated domestic goose or maybe a snow goose? Both missing a leg?
Richard’s third lap
Form an orderly queue, please
Bit muddy on the way back up to Cumnor
Select any thumbnail below for a full screen slideshow
Here’s the cormorant swallowing the fish. I only had a 100mm lens, and the bird was not close, so there’s a massive amount of cropping, and re-enlarging to get these.
Select any thumbnail below for a full screen slideshow
If you want to see a cormorant trying to swallow an even bigger fish, check out this Mark Smith YouTube video. And here’s a blue heron trying something similar.
I did much of this walk in February 2023. Photos here. Some will be familiar from today. And there are pictures of Snow Geese at Farmoor here. (March 2023)
7 replies on “Photos from walk on Thursday 4th January from Cumnor Village Hall around Farmoor Reservoir”
Thank you David, even in my absence. I tried that once with a doner kebab. Didn’t end well.
Fab pictures as usual David, particularly liked the Cormorant sequence and thanks for the links to other examples of this amazing sight
Lovely photos of a muddy day ! Thankyou xx
I’m told that the unlucky fish is likely to be a Mirror Carp (Cyprinus carpio carpio)
Great photos, David, thanks. I wasn’t there but could so envisage what and how you saw it. The whole cormorant-swallows-huge-fish sequence was stunning— liked your comments!!
Wonderful cormorant pictures. Reminded me of a trip to Pagham Harbour years ago and watching a grey heron battling with an eel. It took getting on for an hour of wrestling, but despite nearly being strangled on numerous occasions the heron won in the end. Great to watch.
Although the cormorant stole the show we did wonder why the resevoir appeared so low when all around was under water.
Here’s why: “Reservoir water levels low despite widespread flooding“. [BBC]
As the man says: Thames Water has “pooed in their own nest”.