SOMORMUJO
(Heb. “Shalak”, “diver”)
Unclean bird (Lev. 11:17; Deut. 14:17).
This is probably the common cormorant, “Phalcacrocorax carbo”, a large bird of the pelicanid family, but without the membrane pouch under the lower jaw.
The common cormorant is widespread: it lives in Palestine, on the Mediterranean coast, and in the Sea of Galilee. His appetite is proverbial.
Tristram describes the cormorant ambushed on a log near the mouth of the Jordan: this bird catches the fish that is paralyzed by the extremely salty waters of the Dead Sea.
Another species, the “phalcacrocorax pigmaens”, a pygmy cormorant, is found in small numbers along the Palestinian rivers that flow towards the Mediterranean.