Secure Shopping
| Black-billed
Cuckoo Cuckoos have been said to sing more often before a rain, earning them the colloquial name, "Rain Crows." The two common and widespread cuckoos of North America are both furtive and retiring birds that remain hidden in foliage much of the time, and are more often seen than heard. The Black-billed Cuckoo is especially secretive and shy. It is not as widely distributed in the breeding season as the Yellow-billed Cuckoo (C. americanus), and does not occur west of the Rocky Mountains. It is usually more common in the northern part of its range than the Yellow-billed Cuckoo, and less common in the southern part of its range. The two species may inhabit the same areas, but in general the Black-billed Cuckoo uses deeper woods and drier, more upland habitats than the Yellow-billed Cuckoo. Black-billed Cuckoo Range Map Black-billed Cuckoos forage by gleaning insects, including grasshoppers and beetles, but especially caterpillars, from foliage in deciduous thickets, edges, and other shrubby places. They are also known to eat less common items such as mollusks, fish, small vertebrates, bird eggs, and fruit. The nest of the Black-billed Cuckoo is large and somewhat flimsy, built of twigs, grasses, and weed stems. It is lined with finer grass, leaves and flowers. Black-billed Cuckoos hide their nests among foliage in low trees, rarely more than 15 feet up, and more often less than six feet off of the ground. The nest may rarely be placed on the ground or on a horizontal log. The female usually lays two to three light blue-green eggs. Both parents care for the young. When hatched, the young are sightless and nearly naked, with black skin sparingly covered in coarse white hairs. However, they develop very rapidly. The parents carry caterpillars to the young using a throat pouch. At one week of age, the young can leave the nest and climb on nearby branches. At three weeks of age, they can fly. When disturbed, young cuckoos adopt a bittern-like pose, freezing in place with elongated neck and bill held straight out. Parasitic egg-laying is not as common in North American cuckoos as it is in European cuckoos. However, the Black-billed Cuckoo has been known to deposit eggs in the nest of the Yellow-billed Cuckoo. More rarely, Black-billed Cuckoos may lay eggs in the nests of Chipping Sparrows, Yellow Warblers, Wood Pewees, Northern Cardinals, Cedar Waxwings, Gray Catbirds, and Wood Thrushes. It is not always possible to distinguish the songs and call notes of Black-billed from Yellow-billed cuckoos. But the patterns of the two species' songs are noticeably different in a long series of notes. The Yellow-billed Cuckoo's characteristic song is longer with single notes given with decreasing speed, ending with a soft slow, "kowp, kowp, kowp...." The Black-billed Cuckoo tends to group its notes in couplets or triplets, following a half dozen introductory single "kowp" notes. Cuckoos sometimes vocalize at night during migration. Description: Black-billed Cuckoos are slender, long-tailed birds. The upperparts are grayish-brown, slightly darker behind the eyes. The underparts are dirty white, duller at the throat and upper chest, while the underside of the tail is gray with small distinct spots. The bill is slender, slightly decurved and usually all dark. The eye is dark and surrounded by a ring of red skin. In the immature plumage, usually maintained until September, the eye ring is grayish rather than red, the spots on the tail duller and less conspicuous, and the throat and chest may be washed with buffy gray. The Black-billed Cuckoo may be distinguished from the Yellow-billed Cuckoo by bill color, and by the lack of the latter's larger white tail spots, clean white underparts, and bright rufous primary feathers. The Mangrove Cuckoo (C. minor) of coastal southern Florida also has large white tail spots and yellow on the lower mandible like a Yellow-billed Cuckoo. However, it has a buffy wash on the underparts, and a dark mask through the eyes. Visit Shaw
Creek Bird Supply and see our
selection of Bird
Houses, Bird
Feeders, Hummingbird
Feeders, Heated
Bird Baths & Audubon
Binoculars |