Lesser Cuckoo

Gangly wader with a long bicolored bill. Breeding plumage is dark brick-red below (male) or pale orangey (female); nonbreeding plumage is overall gray-brown with white belly; compare to Black-tailed Godwit. In flight shows rather plain upperwings with only a faint whitish wing stripe; white rump and finely barred tail. Mainly coastal away from tundra breeding grounds. Often in flocks feeding on mudflats and in brackish coastal lagoons, roosting in adjacent freshwater habitats. Feeds by probing its long bill into the mud.

A highly variable finch with three distinct forms in the process of diversifying. The massive large-billed form is known as “Dunn’s Finch”; the two smaller forms with petite bills are a drab olive lowland form (Lowland Finch) and a bright yellow highland form (Highland Finch). Females of all forms are smaller, duller, and more streaked than males. Endemic to Inaccessible Island, where it is the only finch. Lowland form prefers grassy coast and cliffs, highland form prefers the plateau, and Dunn’s form prefers taller fruit-bearing woodland. In all forms, male sings a 3-note “whit-it-teeu” and the female whistles; Dunn’s form sounds deeper and slower than the others.

Chunky, short-tailed, flat-headed bird patterned in green and black. Male has black head and breast, pale yellow belly with bold dark barring, and mossy green upperparts with bold pale spotting on the wing. Female is similar but has a green head with barring all the way up the throat. On both sexes, note red bill and legs and pale eye varying from orange to gray to whitish. Fairly common in stunted forested habitats in the upper subtropical and temperate zone in the Andes. Sluggish; perches quietly in the middle levels of the forest, sometimes following a mixed-species flock. May be seen singly or in pairs, but several can gather around a fruiting tree. Listen for super high-pitched calls.