birding-aus

Re: Currawongs and Channel-billed Cuckoos

To: Lesley & Michael Brooker <>, alan morris <>
Subject: Re: Currawongs and Channel-billed Cuckoos
From: Charles Hunter <>
Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 17:42:11 +1100 (EST)
Hi all,
 
I've just come back from Pearl Beach on the NSW Central Coast (safe from the fires) where I had seen over several days a large juv. Channel-billed Cuckoo being fed by two Pied Currawongs.
 
To be honest it was quite a funny observation. The juvenile Channel-billed Cuckoo much larger than both "parents", screaming out constantly for more food, literally attacking one of the Currawongs when it was being fed.
 
On a number of occasions the Channel-billed Cuckoo was flying around in circles, obviously practising for its immanent flight north!
 
Regards,
Charles Hunter
Kings Cross, Sydney


Lesley & Michael Brooker <> wrote:
Hi Birders,

Whilst Channel-billed Cuckoos most often lay only one egg per host nest, it
is not uncommon for them to lay two or even 3 in a nest. Goddard and
Marchant (Australian Birds 17:65-72) have published a table in which they
show some records of 5, 6, 7 and 8 cuckoo eggs in the nests of crows. Three
was the most they recorded in a Pied Currawongs nest. Salter (Bird Observer
559) found a nest with "three channel-bills of different ages, the first one
leaving the nest three weeks before the last one. In 1977 the crows raised
two of their own species plus one channel-bill. The young crows left the
nest several weeks before the cuckoo.."

Lesley Brooker
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