Home made Cormorant decoy informstio

[Ade]

Hi. I wish to make these myself. Has anyone got any information/ drawings about making homemade cormorant decoys  from ply and painted etc. If anyone has, please email me 

asblackwell123@gmail.com 

 

Regards

 

[Penelope]

4 hours ago, Ade said:

Hi. I wish to make these myself. Has anyone got any information/ drawings about making homemade cormorant decoys  from ply and painted etc. If anyone has, please email me 

asblackwell123@gmail.com 

 

Regards

 

I assume you wanted something in 2D, so something upright around 2 1/2ft in height with a long 'S' neck and an open wing span of 5 foot, painted black should do to mimic the photo below.

[RCB56]

If you are going to use the decoys so you can shoot cormorants, make sure you have got the correct license to do so as they are a protected species and CANNOT be shot under the general license.

[billytheghillie]

Mate of mine shot one, skinned it, used a empty coke bottle for body, wire coat hangers to spread out wings, he shot a lot of kormies with that decoy, with his camera of course 😉

[marsh man]

3 hours ago, billytheghillie said:

Mate of mine shot one, skinned it, used a empty coke bottle for body, wire coat hangers to spread out wings, he shot a lot of kormies with that decoy, with his camera of course 😉

I bet even the top chefs on the forum couldn't make one edible , I know the estate once applied for a licence to trim out a few as they were clearing all the fish up in the lake and white washing the trees when roosting , the rig more al was endless , I believe in the end they were issued with a permit to shoot four , still they were covered if one was seen shot .   MM

[London Best]

An estate I helped keeper for fifteen years applied for a licence to shoot cormorants as the fishing tenants were moaning. 
Loadsa rigmarole. 
Eventually granted a licence to shoot two! 
We never did manage to fill that licence! 
But Gloucester docks must have been jammed up with them! 
.22 Hornet or .222 Remington highly recommended whilst drying their wings.

[billytheghillie]

When i ghillied the scottish license we were issued with was 6, and as LB and MM says a lot of rigmarole. It was a good job for the fish as us ghillies cant count! 😉

[JKD]

2 hours ago, billytheghillie said:

It was a good job for the fish as us ghillies cant count! 😉

I'm sure that's a common occurrence nationwide 😉

[UK fowler]

I have 3 plastic one that you are welcome too if you pay the P&P one with wings two floating dont shoot over the lakes anymore so not being used 

[Penelope]

14 minutes ago, UK fowler said:

I have 3 plastic one that you are welcome too if you pay the P&P one with wings two floating dont shoot over the lakes anymore so not being used 

If the offer is not taking up by the OP, I would like these, please. More than happy to cover P&P.

Please PM to take further.

[marsh man]

On 22/11/2023 at 23:29, JKD said:

I'm sure that's a common occurrence nationwide 😉

We never got a single complaint from any member of the public, although they were shot with a rifle and the Lake had a full time keeper who looked after the wildfowl collection , the area is very private and no more than one or two would had been shot at a time ,  MM 

[JKD]

1 minute ago, marsh man said:

We never got a single complaint from any member of the public, although they were shot with a rifle and the Lake had a full time keeper who looked after the wildfowl collection , the area is very private and no more than one or two would had been shot at a time ,  MM 

Exactly the same on a fishery I know. The fishing club got a licence yearly, for 6 [?] cormorants if I recall. I can confidently say, the guy who shot them got that number every WEEK !!! AND, could have shot many more, but he was very limited with time, obviously.

[TIGHTCHOKE]

It certainly pays to get the weakest mathematician to do the shooting.  

[JKD]

45 minutes ago, TIGHTCHOKE said:

It certainly pays to get the weakest mathematician to do the shooting.  

..... Or the dyslexic one who reads "annual" as weekly 🥴🙈

[fse10]

I have a licence for six on my club lake as said could shoot that in an hour some days. Ive often thought of getting/making some decoys to get them within range. Only issue i can see is your only allowed to shoot them to stop them from coming in to feed so if your was caught decoying them they may take a dim view on that.

 

Edited November 26, 2023 by fse10
add text.

[marsh man]

7 minutes ago, fse10 said:

I have a licence for six on my club lake as said could shoot that in an hour some days. Ive often thought of getting/making some decoys to get them within range. Only issue i can see is your only allowed to shoot them to stop them from coming in to feed so if your was caught decoying them they may take a dim view on that.

 

Tricky one fse 10 , we had the advantage of having several dead trees where they would roost in the trees , these trees looked like they had been painted with a lime wash and with having a hide nearby it was far easier to knock one down from a tree rather than try to shoot one on the water , this also made it easier to pick up and the dead ones would be buried in various places well spaced out in the woods . MM  

[Scully]

A few lads used to shoot them on the Eden, but when we applied to the EA some years ago they were totally indifferent as to whether we had permits or not. 🤷‍♂️

[Penelope]

16 hours ago, Scully said:

A few lads used to shoot them on the Eden, but when we applied to the EA some years ago they were totally indifferent as to whether we had permits or not. 🤷‍♂️

The EA must have some sensible staff then?

[marsh man]

33 minutes ago, Penelope said:

The EA must have some sensible staff then?

I wonder how many can tell the difference from a **** to a Cormorant ? doubt if you would see many on inland waterways but on the coast they are not that rare . 

P S  Just seen the species of the bird have been crossed out 

Edited November 27, 2023 by marsh man

[JKD]

48 minutes ago, marsh man said:

I wonder how many can tell the difference from a **** to a Cormorant ? doubt if you would see many on inland waterways but on the coast they are not that rare .  

Myself, and plenty of others on here, will tell you otherwise re these birds on inland waterways 😠🤬 The experts will also tell us that they will only eat a few fish of up to a certain quite small size per day,,,, yeah right 🤬🤬🤬

Edited November 27, 2023 by JKD

[Old Boggy]

On 22/11/2023 at 20:08, marsh man said:

I bet even the top chefs on the forum couldn't make one edible , I know the estate once applied for a licence to trim out a few as they were clearing all the fish up in the lake and white washing the trees when roosting , the rig more al was endless , I believe in the end they were issued with a permit to shoot four , still they were covered if one was seen shot .   MM

Morning John,

Chris Green had a chef cook one on one of his DVDs and reckoned it tasted like the best beef. Those Cornish guys referred to them as a ‘Parson’. I’m sure there are other slang terms for them in other parts of the country. Be interesting to hear some.

My pal has a licence to shoot 4 on his inland marsh, but he, like others, is very forgetful as to how many he can shoot😂.

I’ve been out pigeon shooting and have seen in excess of 2000 flying over heading for his marsh. Shooting 4 really is going to make difference to numbers 

This post reminds me of that very old joke -:

Why was the Puffin puffin. Because it had just had a S-h-a-g on the rocks.

OB

[Penelope]

One has to remember that the Cormorants that are seen on inland waters are a tree nesting subspecies that made their way over from the continent where their habitat is fresh water.

 

Continental birds are of a different subspecies from those in Britain: sinensis as opposed to nominate carbo. A significant difference is that, whereas carbo nests on coastal cliffs, sinensis nests in trees. This simple fact has accounted for a 53 per cent range expansion in Britain since the first nesting by sinensis in 1981 (at Abberton Reservoir, Essex).

By 2005 there were an estimated 2,100 pairs of sinensis nesting in Britain. However, since the establishment of inland tree nesting by sinensis Great Cormorants, nominate birds have also started to breed inland, particularly in those sinensis colonies that are older and well established (Newson et al 2007).

1 hour ago, marsh man said:

I wonder how many can tell the difference from a **** to a Cormorant ? doubt if you would see many on inland waterways but on the coast they are not that rare . 

P S  Just seen the species of the bird have been crossed out 

John.

I regularly see 200 + hunting on a large gravel pit a couple of miles north of the M25 in the Lea valley. There is a large nesting colony there. They are now rife on inland waterways.

There is a very large population in Greater London at Walthamstow reservoirs, where the nesting colonies have destroyed the trees via their defecation.

[marsh man]

1 hour ago, JKD said:

Myself, and plenty of others on here, will tell you otherwise re these birds on inland waterways 😠🤬 The experts will also tell us that they will only eat a few fish of up to a certain quite small size per day,,,, yeah right 🤬🤬🤬

 

1 hour ago, Penelope said:

One has to remember that the Cormorants that are seen on inland waters are a tree nesting subspecies that made their way over from the continent where their habitat is fresh water.

 

Continental birds are of a different subspecies from those in Britain: sinensis as opposed to nominate carbo. A significant difference is that, whereas carbo nests on coastal cliffs, sinensis nests in trees. This simple fact has accounted for a 53 per cent range expansion in Britain since the first nesting by sinensis in 1981 (at Abberton Reservoir, Essex).

By 2005 there were an estimated 2,100 pairs of sinensis nesting in Britain. However, since the establishment of inland tree nesting by sinensis Great Cormorants, nominate birds have also started to breed inland, particularly in those sinensis colonies that are older and well established (Newson et al 2007).

John.

I regularly see 200 + hunting on a large gravel pit a couple of miles north of the M25 in the Lea valley. There is a large nesting colony there. They are now rife on inland waterways.

There is a very large population in Greater London at Walthamstow reservoirs, where the nesting colonies have destroyed the trees via their defecation.

 

1 hour ago, Old Boggy said:

Morning John,

Chris Green had a chef cook one on one of his DVDs and reckoned it tasted like the best beef. Those Cornish guys referred to them as a ‘Parson’. I’m sure there are other slang terms for them in other parts of the country. Be interesting to hear some.

My pal has a licence to shoot 4 on his inland marsh, but he, like others, is very forgetful as to how many he can shoot😂.

I’ve been out pigeon shooting and have seen in excess of 2000 flying over heading for his marsh. Shooting 4 really is going to make difference to numbers 

This post reminds me of that very old joke -:

Why was the Puffin puffin. Because it had just had a S-h-a-g on the rocks.

OB

Going by the above posts it now seem these large fish eating birds are more abundance in inland waters than possibly on the coast , we never had big numbers on the estuary and they would mainly work where the rivers meet , also I would imagine we had more fish in rivers at that time , then a lot moved to the nearby lake , this is where the numbers started to increase with the lake holding plenty of fish , when the fish stocks started to go down then they would head out to sea in the mornings and then in the afternoons they would head back to spend the night perched up the trees , this is when you often see groups of 15/20 flying in a perfect V formation which look at first like small parties of geese coming back as a lot of geese also spend a day out at sea .    MM

[London Best]

1 hour ago, Penelope said:

One has to remember that the Cormorants that are seen on inland waters are a tree nesting subspecies that made their way over from the continent where their habitat is fresh water.

 

Continental birds are of a different subspecies from those in Britain: sinensis as opposed to nominate carbo. A significant difference is that, whereas carbo nests on coastal cliffs, sinensis nests in trees. This simple fact has accounted for a 53 per cent range expansion in Britain since the first nesting by sinensis in 1981 (at Abberton Reservoir, Essex).

By 2005 there were an estimated 2,100 pairs of sinensis nesting in Britain. However, since the establishment of inland tree nesting by sinensis Great Cormorants, nominate birds have also started to breed inland, particularly in those sinensis colonies that are older and well established (Newson et al 2007).

 

Thanks for the information. I didn’t know that.

We have certainly had cormorants here in Derbyshire since at least the early 1980’s.

[Penelope]

26 minutes ago, London Best said:

Thanks for the information. I didn’t know that.

We have certainly had cormorants here in Derbyshire since at least the early 1980’s.

Early 80's is when sinensis invaded.

52 minutes ago, marsh man said:

more abundance in inland waters than possibly on the coast

Oh, without a doubt, John. They have and are causing significant damage to many fisheries, both made made and wild.