Once upon a time there was a very lazy cormorant that lived on a big lake in a large city. It often couldn’t be bothered looking for food and on this particular day it hadn’t eaten anything for a few days so its tummy was rumbling. It looked around the lake to see what might make the most delicious lunch for the least amount of effort.

Just at that very moment a huge eel came slithering past and the cormorant thought, ‘Aha! What a tasty lunch that would be, and that eel is so big I wouldn’t have to eat again for several days.’ The cormorant grabbed the eel with its long strong beak and opened its mouth as wide as it possibly could – and, if you’ve ever seen a cormorant open its mouth, you’ll know that’s pretty wide!

Down, down, down its throat slithered the eel.

But the cormorant’s tummy wasn’t big enough to fit such an enormous meal and, of course, the eel didn’t want to die. It had a lot more lake-slithering to do. So, it wiggled and wriggled and slid back out of the cormorant’s mouth.

Of course, the cormorant didn’t want to let such a lovely big lunch get away, so it tried again. Gulp, gulp, gulp, down went the eel. Wiggle, wriggle, wiggle, out slid the eel.

It was a mighty struggle between two very determined opponents and it went on for at least half an hour but, eventually, because the comorant was so lazy and hadn’t eaten for a few days, it ran out of energy. Off swam the eel, relieved and happy to have escaped the cormorant’s lunch menu!