About Phalacrocorax fuscicollis Stephens, 1826
This is a medium-sized bronze brown cormorant. Its upper plumage has black scalloped patterning, it has no crest, and it has a small, slightly peaked head. Its long narrow bill ends in a hooked tip. It has blue eyes, and bare yellow facial skin during the non-breeding season. Breeding individuals develop a short white ear tuft. Some plumages include a white throat, but this white area is restricted below the gape, unlike the pattern seen in the much larger great cormorant. Males and females have similar appearances. Non-breeding adults and juveniles are browner than breeding adults. This cormorant fishes in groups, mainly in inland rivers and large wetlands of peninsular India and northern Sri Lanka. It can also be found in estuaries and mangroves, but does not live on the open coast. It breeds only in very localized mixed-species breeding colonies. Its range extends northeast into Assam, and eastward into Thailand, Burma, and Cambodia.
