Yellow-billed Cuckoo

IDENTIFICATION: A long-tailed bird with white undersides, a dull brown back, and a yellow lower bill. Chestnut wing patches are striking in flight. It lacks the black eye mask of the commoner Mangrove Cuckoo. Length: 26-30 cm.; weight: 55-65 g.

VOICE: The call is a rapid series of low-pitched, twangy notes, decelerating toward the end: "ka ka ka ka kow kow kow." Audio (M. Oberle).

HABITAT: Thick vegetation especially in coastal scrub forests, but also in wetlands and some moist forests.

HABITS: The Yellow-billed Cuckoo hops through thickets foraging primarily on caterpillars, but also on grasshoppers, cicadas, spiders, and other insects, as well as frogs, lizards, and berries. It usually gleans insects from leaves, but sometimes hovers to grab an insect, or hawks insects from the air. Many details of its breeding biology are unknown, especially in Puerto Rico. In North America, breeding is sometimes timed to coincide with insect outbreaks. Both sexes build a flimsy twig nest. The female lays 2-3 eggs, although some nests may contain the eggs of more than one female. Both sexes incubate the eggs for 9-11 days and both parents feed the young. A week after hatching, the chicks climb around on branches near the nest; they fledge at about three weeks. In addition to building its own nest, this species has been known to lay its eggs in the nests of at least 11 other species of birds.

STATUS AND CONSERVATION: An uncommon, permanent resident of Puerto Rico and Vieques, with additional birds migrating through the Caribbean to winter grounds in South America. The North American breeding population has declined in the last few decades.

RANGE: Breeds in the Greater Antilles and in the eastern and southwestern USA, south to Mexico. A typical location to find this species is in dry scrub forest, such as near Laguna Cartagena or at Guánica State Forest.

TAXONOMY: CUCULIFORMES; CUCULIDAE; Coccyzinae

References

Arendt, W.J. 1992. Status of North American migrant landbirds in the Caribbean region: a summary. Pp. 143-171 in Ecology and conservation of neotropical migrant landbirds (J.M. Hagan III and D.W. Johnston, eds.) Smithsonian Instit. Press, Washington, D.C.

Hughes, J.M. 1999. Yellow-billed Cuckoo (Coccyzus americanus) in The birds of North America (A. Poole and F. Gill, eds.). No. 418. Acad. Nat. Sci., Philadelphia, PA, and Am. Ornithol. Union, Washington, D.C.

Bent, A.C. 1940. Life histories of North American cuckoos, goatsuckers, hummingbirds and their allies. Smithsonian Instit. U.S. National Museum Bull. 176.

del Hoyo, J., A. Elliott, and J. Sargatal, eds. 1998. Handbook of Birds of the World, Vol. 4. Sandgrouse to cuckoos. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona.

Ehrlich, P.R., D.S. Dobkin, and D. Wheye. 1988. The birderÆs handbook: a field guide to the natural history of North American birds. Simon and Schuster/ Fireside, NY.

Hughes, J.M.. 1999. Yellow-billed Cuckoo (Coccyzus americanus) No. 418 in The birds of North America (A. Poole and F. Gill, eds.). The Birds of North America, Inc., Philadelphia, PA.

Norton, R. L. 1981. Additional records and notes of birds in the Virgin Islands. Am Birds 35:144-147.

Raffaele, H.A. 1989. A guide to the birds of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Princeton.

Raffaele, H.A. 1989. Una guía a las aves de Puerto Rico y las Islas Vírgenes. Publishing Resources, Inc., Santurce, PR.

Raffaele, H.A., J.W. Wiley, O.H. Garrido, A.R. Keith, and J.I. Raffaele. 1998. Guide to the birds of the West Indies. Princeton.

Sorrie, B.A. 1975. Observations on the birds of Vieques Island, Puerto Rico. Carib. J. Sci. 15:89-103.

Yellow-billed Cuckoo, Spanish text

Back to Species Selection Page Menu

Return to first page of the CD-ROM