Cormorant Drying Its Wings on a Wooden Piling

Cormorants hunt by diving, chasing fish underwater with their big webbed feet. Their feathers let in more water than a duck's do, which cuts down on buoyancy and makes the dive easier. The cost comes afterward, when a soaked bird has to stand with its wings held wide to dry, the pose in this cormorant jigsaw puzzle. This one has picked a mossy wooden piling above gray tidal water, its hooked bill and yellow throat patch turned into the wind.