When I go home from work, I get on I-5 South from eastbound 220th St in
Mountlake Terrace (15 miles north of Seattle in Snohomish County). Last
night (Tuesday, July 11) as I drove down the entrance ramp at 5:15 PM a
Yellow-billed Cuckoo flew alongside me and then right in front of me across
the ramp. Except for the very long tail, it is amazing how falcon like
their flight profile is. The coloring of course is very unfalcon like.
The throat, chest, belly, and undertail coverts are all snow white and the
tail shows a very striking black and white pattern. A Black-billed Cuckoo
would have shown a less striking gray and white tail pattern. When I first
saw the bird it was flying very quickly to evade a smaller bird that was
pursuing it. Since I was focusing on the cuckoo, I am not sure what the
pursuer was, perhaps a Brewer's Blackbird.
I came to work early this morning so that I could walk around the area. I
had always been under the impression that this property was part of Edmonds
Community College but in fact it is a preschool (with some college
affiliation). I also walked around on the island between the ramp and the
freeway which is where the bird had originally flown from. I was unable to
relocate the bird. There is however a healthy crop of tent caterpillars (a
favored food of cuckoos) primarily in birch trees so the bird may return.
I'm going to keep my eye out for it.

Jim Elder (jelder at sea-dmi.com)
SEA, Inc.
7030 220th St. SW
Mountlake Terrace, WA