Kurzflügelkuckuck

Bestimmung

This is a medium-sized cuckoo with both sexes alike. It has grey upperparts while the underside has broad black barring. The tail is barred with a broad subterminal dark band and a white tip. Young birds have white markings on the crown and white chin and throat contrasting with a dark face. Juveniles are browner and have broad white tips to the head and wing feathers. The eye-ring is gray to yellow (a feature shared with the common hawk-cuckoo). The iris is light brown to reddish. The female differs from the male in being slightly paler grey on the throat and in having more brown on the breast and tail. The barring on the belly is narrower than in the male. Nestlings have an orange-red mouth and yellow flanges to the gape.<p>The call is loud with four notes. They have been transcribed as "orange-pekoe", "bo-ko-ta-ko", "crossword puzzle" or "one more bottle". In northern India, they can be locally common during the breeding season with densities estimated at a calling bird for every 2 km2 (0.77 sq mi).<p>They feed on hairy caterpillars and other insects but sometimes take fruits. They usually feed on the upper canopy, gleaning insects, sometimes making aerial sallies for flying termites or rarely even by hovering lower near the ground.

Taxonomie

Two subspecies are generally recognized. The nominate form is found in much of continental Asia, while concretus S. Müller, 1845 which is smaller and darker is known from the Malay Peninsula, Java, Sumatra and Borneo. The birds in the Amur region are larger and Swinhoe described a form from northern China as Cuculus michieanus while Walter Norman Koelz described a form fatidicus from northeastern India.

Wissenschaftlicher Name

Cuculus micropterus

Autorität

Gould, 1838

Ordnung

Kuckucksvögel

Familie

Kuckucke (Cuculidae)

Gattung

Cuculus

Verbreitung und Lebensraum

The species is found widely distributed across Asia, from the Indian subcontinent eastwards to Southeast Asia. The preferred habitat is deciduous and evergreen forests but also occur in garden lands and thick scrub.<p>Some populations in India migrate south in winter, although there are breeding populations in the southern areas as well, with specimens netted at night or recorded at lighthouses. The population in the Amurland of the Russia is migratory.

Zugverhalten

Vollzieher

Verhalten

Zugverhalten: Vollzieher.

Schutzstatus

Bestandstrend: rückläufig.

Bestandstrend

rückläufig