If you’ve never heard of this species of bird, allow me to introduce you to the cormorant.
All you need to really know about these aquatic birds are that they are usually dark feathered, they are excellent divers, and they mainly feed on fish. And they are bad news for fish, considering that their exceptional diving ability allows for cormorants to dive up to 150 feet below the water.
One might even say that cormorants are nemeses of all fish since they are so successful with their fishing ventures. Let’s just say that if you were a fish (like this one in the video below), you would almost rather face off against any other bird.
This double-crested cormorant made short work of this largemouth bass, and may I say that this fish really put the “large” in largemouth. Any fisherman (or fisherwoman) would love to reel this sized gamefish in, but this bird beat all the fishermen to it.
Once the big bird catches the bass, it does its best to swallow it in one fell swoop. However, it doesn’t go down very easily, and takes multiple tries to slide the large fish down its gullet.
The video was captured by photographer Mark Smith, who captioned his remarkable footage with this:
“I’m always amazed at bird’s ability to capture prey. Cormorants especially.
These birds catch fish underwater by doing nothing more than chasing them down and grabbing them with their mouths.
This bird caught a prized large mouth bass but can it swallow this massive fish?”
Yes, it can…
Take a look at bird swallowing the big fish whole in the video below:
Instagram users were in awe of Mark Smith’s camera work, and the fact that the bird was able to gobble down the largemouth bass in one big gulp:
“Being an angler, this is sad.”
“Holy crap! That’s incredible!”
“Oh my gosh, can’t believe that! The whole thing! Aye Yai Yai!”
“Incredible! Never would have believed it possible.”
“That bird was hangry!”
And speaking of Mark’s camera work… give him a follow:
