JOURNALIST: Jenny Oldland
A PROGRAM to discourage cormorants from roosting in trees along Stansbury’s foreshore has ramped up in the past fortnight with encouraging results. 
Some 400 to 500 birds had been congregating in the area, their presence felt with cars, walkways, railings, trees and parts of the local hotel covered in excrement.
“The numbers had increased dramatically and they were nesting in the remaining Norfolk Island pines and in one of the Morton Bay fig trees adjacent the hotel with disastrous results,” local Ken Osterstock said.
Mr Osterstock, a member of the Stansbury Progress Association and Tidy Towns group, has been coordinating the program to scare the birds away from the area.
“The smell from the sheer number of birds was awful, and we had to have the CFS come down on three or four occasions to clean the walkways along the foreshore, and the hotel had to get someone with high-pressure equipment to clean their walls and windows, it was disgusting,” he said.
For the full report, see the print issue of this week's YP Country Times.