Common Cuckoo

Can be confused withSource

• Eurasian Sparrowhawk — The Cuckoo resembles a Sparrowhawk in flight, but flies with regular wingbeats, has a yellow iris, yellow orbital ring and yellow feet, and often perches openly with drooping wings and a raised tail.

Plumage and variationSource

Male and female: All adult males are slate-grey with a sharp boundary between the grey throat and the barred underparts. The female is like the male but has a pinkish- or buff-toned wash to the barring and neck sides, and a less sharp boundary; a rare rufous morph has reddish-brown upperparts barred dark.

Juvenile: The juvenile’s clearest marks are a white nape patch and white feather fringes.

VoiceSource

The male gives a two-note "cuck-oo"; the female has a loud, bubbling, almost laughing call, and the juvenile a high, rising cry.

BehaviourSource

A brood parasite: builds no nest and raises no young of its own, laying about nine eggs spread across other birds’ nests. In the breeding season it settles readily on an open perch with drooped wings and a raised tail. Specialises in hairy caterpillars other birds avoid, plus beetles, spiders and earthworms.

When and whereSource

A migrant arriving in late April or early May and leaving from late July to mid-September for winter quarters south of the Sahara. In Denmark it lays with about 30 species, chiefly pipits and warblers.

Facts

RelativesSource