TERRIGAL - CHANNEL BILLED CUCKOO - 9 JANUARY 2015

My daughter called out to me asking what bird is that?. I came out to the upstairs deck and was amazed by this bird.

It was mottled grey with a large beak. I guessed that it might be a cuckoo.

I got a few photos and then we searched the web for it.

Luckily guess, t'was a cuckoo.

Scientific Name: Scythrops novaehollandiae

Distribution: 

The Channel-billed Cuckoo migrates to northern and eastern Australia from New Guinea and Indonesia between August and October each year. The birds leave Australia in February or March.

 

Habitat: 

The Channel-billed Cuckoo is found in tall open forests, usually where host species occur.

Feeding: 

The favoured foods of the Channel-billed Cuckoo are native figs and native fruits, though some seeds, insects and even baby birds are also taken. The birds take figs from the tree with their massive bills.

Breeding: 

The Channel-billed Cuckoo lays its eggs in the nests of the Australian Magpie, Gymnorhina tibicen, the Pied Currawong, Strepera graculina and members of the crow family (Corvidae). Unlike many other cuckoos, the young birds do not evict the host's young or eggs from the nest, but simply grow faster and demand all the food, thus starving the others. Often the adult female will damage the existing eggs in the nest when she lays her own and she may even lay more than one egg in a single nest.