Subject: more thoughts on cuckoos
Date: Dec 15 15:37:48 1997
From: Steve Hampton - hampton at primal.ucdavis.edu



>From a California lurker (but I'll be in Tweetland next week):

Folks may not appreciate just how rare and how late YELLOW-BILLED
CUCKOOS are in California. In the past 15 years, the number of
pairs in the state has dropped from something like 200 to less than
100, with most at the southern tip of the Sierras (the Kern Preserve).
In the Sacramento Valley, the number of pairs may be very small,
perhaps under 25 birds. We're along their migration route (the
Sacramento River) and just had our first county record in 12 years--
a bird, presumably migrating north, in early July last year.
I think birds didn't arrive at the Kern until late June last year.
We have no May records.

Cuckoos are also the quickest to nest (from egg-laying to fledging)
among any N. American landbird and among the earliest to depart
(in August) in the fall.


Steve Hampton

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
hampton at primal.ucdavis.edu
http://www.agecon.ucdavis.edu/homepages/hampton/index.htm

Dept. of Ag. and Resource Economics
UC Davis, Davis, CA 95616 USA