How Satellite Tracking Is Helping Scientists Understand Cuckoos

13/05/2020

ROSAMMA THOMAS

Five cuckoos, one Oriental Cuckoo and four Common Cuckoos (they look very similar but sound different and are different species) were fitted with transmitters in June last year around the Khurkh Bird Banding Centre in Northern Mongolia. These birds take advantage of the explosion of insects in the summer in Siberia to breed. By autumn, they fly to warmer places and their long-distance flights are mostly by night. Since 2009, these birds have been on the Red List of Birds of Conservation Concern.

The transmitters, which fit as small backpacks, send signals that satellites orbiting the Earth pick up. This helps scientists trace the flight path of the birds, which migrate not in groups but often as solitary travellers. On occasion, small groups may also be found.

The project, a partnership between the Wildlife Science and Conservation Centre of Mongolia, the British Trust for Ornithology and Birding Beijing, seeks a deeper understanding of the flight of the birds, to determine the reasons for the decline in their numbers.

In the UK, in the past 20 years, cuckoo numbers have declined by over half, the website of the British Trust for Ornithology explains. The cuckoo tracking project is also an attempt to foster greater involvement of local communities in conservation.

Schoolchildren in Mongolia were encouraged to name the birds irds fitted with transmitters, all of which were male. They were named Nomad (the Oriental Cuckoo), Captain Khurkh, Namja (storyteller in Mongolian folklore), Bayan (Mongolian for ‘prosper’) and Onon (the name of a local river).

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Scientists expose true extent of cuckoo's cunning

September 4, 2017

The common cuckoo, notorious for evading parental duty by hiding her eggs in the nests of other brooding birds, is even more devious than previously thought, scientists revealed on Monday.

After laying an egg, the female distracts the owner of the nest—a reed warbler in this case—essentially by frightening the poor bird out of its wits, they said.

The cuckoo gives a "chuckle" that mimmicks the call of the sparrowhawk—which loves to snack on warbler flesh—before abandoning her egg among the warbler's clutch and flying off to freedom.

"This hawk-like chuckle call increases the success of parasitism by diverting host parents' attention away from the clutch and towards their own safety," a duo of Cambridge University researchers wrote in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution.

"As a result, the female cuckoo might have 'the last laugh' in this particular battle."

The bird whose behaviour gave us the word "cuckoldry", is an example of a "brood parasite"—birds, insects or fish that trick others into raising their young.

This is often at the expense of the foster parents' own offspring.

To avoid getting caught—which will lead to the imposter egg being kicked out of the nest—the cuckoo has developed some nifty tricks, including matching its egg colouring to that of its target, for camouflage.

The bird has also adopted "remarkable secrecy and speed" in depositing its egg, said the team.

For this reason, scientists have battled to understand why the cuckoo would risk exposure by "chuckling" so soon after committing its crime.

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New bird spotted in Karoo National Park

2016-02-03 13:30 - Louzel Lombard

Cape Town - SANParks Honorary Ranger Japie Claassen has spotted the iconic Common Cuckoo in the Karoo National Park, enriching the already abundant birdlife in the park with one more interesting sighting option.

Claassen, from Karoo Birding Safaris, says that while patrolling along the Park’s boundary fence on the Loxton Road outside Beaufort West at the end of January, he stumbled across the beautiful Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) and formerly known as the European Cuckoo – the first sighting of this bird in the Park.

The Common Cuckoo has been the centrepiece of cuckoo clocks since the early 1600’s – with its signature call striking on the hour, every hour.

Claassen says they are relatively quiet - not heard often in South Africa.  They originate in Europe and are seldom seen in the Karoo areas.  They feed on large, hairy black and white caterpillars, usually found on Acacia trees.  

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Birders go cuckoo for rare bird: Rare sighting of Eurasian bird draws crowd

Photo: Wikipedia

WATSONVILLE -- The Common Cuckoo is a rare bird indeed, at least when it lands near downtown Watsonville.

A sighting of the bird, also known as the Eurasian Cuckoo, is only the second recorded in the lower 48, the last time in 1981 on Martha's Vineyard.

Birders, including many out-of-towners, are flocking to the Ramsay Park area to see it. At one point during the weekend, more than 100 people lined up in hopes of catching a glimpse of what might be the rarest bird ever spotted in Santa Cruz County.

According to Sharon Hull, the Sentinel's garden columnist, the bird appears to be molting, which means it could be sticking around for a while. She said it's been hanging out in willow thickets and feeding on caterpillars.

http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_21672615/birders-go-cuckoo-rare-bird-rare-sighting-eurasian

More information on the common cuckoo (Cuculus canorus):

http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/speciesfactsheet.php?id=1205