Re: [nfc-l] migrating cuckoos

[Kenneth Victor Rosenberg]

Hi all,

I just heard a YELLOW-BILLED CI|UCKOO high over my house at 10:50 this evening 
-- giving the long "K'OW K'OW" call series.

thanks for all the info and anecdotes on mid-summer calling in cuckoos, I am 
aware of the odd mid-summer calling and I have heard (mostly BBCU} on warm 
summer nights. I also hear a scattering of calls from both cuckoos, along with 
few thrushes and other migrants) consistently through the first week of June. 
The birds I heard were high in the sky and appeared to be moving (but it is 
certainly possible that I m wrong.

KEN.


Ken Rosenberg
Conservation Science Program
Cornell Lab of Ornithology
607-254-2412
607-342-4594 (cell)
k...@cornell.edu

On Jun 7, 2012, at 5:57 AM, Bill Evans wrote:

There’s a delightful old paper by Gerald Thayer describing "the mid-summer, 
mid-night, mid-sky gyrations of the Black-billed Cuckoo, as noted by my father 
and me for three consecutive seasons in the southwestern corner of New 
Hampshire":

”Several years before we discovered the nocturnal-flight phenomenon, we began 
to be puzzled by the extreme frequency of Cuckoo calls on summer nights. 
***They uttered both the cow-row notes and the rolling guttural call; but the 
guttural was much the commoner of the two, except on dark, foggy nights, when 
the case was usually reversed. ***The birds were often so far up as to be only 
faintly audible when directly overhead, with no obstructions interposed; and 
this on a still night would seem to mean an elevation of at least a hundred and 
fifty yards. They sometimes flew lower, however, and on cloudy nights often 
moved about barely above the tree-tops.”
“On the evening of July 11-a pitch-dark evening with a thundershower 
lowering,-they were remarkably noisy, both sitting in trees and flying high in 
air. The seated ones, of which I heard only two, made the Cowcow notes, while 
all the flying ones made the liquid gurgle. I heard this note overhead between 
thirty and forty times in the course of about three hours, during half of which 
time I was afoot on the road.”

-- Thayer, G. H. 1903. The Mystery of the Black-billed Cuckoo. Bird Lore 
5:143-145.

In a big nocturnal flight I heard moving up the St. Croix River (MN/WI) in late 
May of 1985, I estimated a rate of passage of Black-billed Cuckoos in the range 
of 100 per hour for at least a few hours in the middle of the night. This was 
not a call total but a rate of vocal birds estimated by following multiple 
calls from apparently the same individual, and it was clear that these birds 
were migrants heading northbound. In 1988-1990 I began recording nocturnal 
flight calls each fall migration period in early July around Ithaca, NY and was 
surprised that in each season the highest rate of BBCU calling was in July 
through early August. There seemed to be a lot of variability in the number of 
calls I recorded between proximal nights, which could be a function of 
weather/wind and microphone pickup dynamics or that the birds tended to prefer 
some nights over others. In the big passerine push from mid –August through 
mid-September across central NY, BBCU flight calls are less common than one 
might expect. Using a Sennheiser shotgun mic back in those days, my rates of 
BBCU nocturnal flight call detection in the latter half of August were in the 
1-2 per hour range (averaged over whole night). In the first half of September 
rates dropped to the range of one call every four hours. Whereas in July 
through early August it was common to record sustained rate through the night 
of 4-5 per hour. But as I mentioned there was a lot of variability from night 
to night.

I haven’t recorded much in June in central NY, but my impression has been that 
the breeding ground flight calling,  the “mid-summer, mid-night, mid-sky, 
gyrations”,  is a phenomenon that increases in July.

Bill E



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Re: [nfc-l] migrating cuckoos

[Bill Evans]

There’s a delightful old paper by Gerald Thayer describing "the mid-summer, 
mid-night, mid-sky gyrations of the Black-billed Cuckoo, as noted by my father 
and me for three consecutive seasons in the southwestern corner of New 
Hampshire":

”Several years before we discovered the nocturnal-flight phenomenon, we began 
to be puzzled by the extreme frequency of Cuckoo calls on summer nights. 
***They uttered both the cow-row notes and the rolling guttural call; but the 
guttural was much the commoner of the two, except on dark, foggy nights, when 
the case was usually reversed. ***The birds were often so far up as to be only 
faintly audible when directly overhead, with no obstructions interposed; and 
this on a still night would seem to mean an elevation of at least a hundred and 
fifty yards. They sometimes flew lower, however, and on cloudy nights often 
moved about barely above the tree-tops.”

“On the evening of July 11-a pitch-dark evening with a thundershower 
lowering,-they were remarkably noisy, both sitting in trees and flying high in 
air. The seated ones, of which I heard only two, made the Cowcow notes, while 
all the flying ones made the liquid gurgle. I heard this note overhead between 
thirty and forty times in the course of about three hours, during half of which 
time I was afoot on the road.”

-- Thayer, G. H. 1903. The Mystery of the Black-billed Cuckoo. Bird Lore 
5:143-145. 

In a big nocturnal flight I heard moving up the St. Croix River (MN/WI) in late 
May of 1985, I estimated a rate of passage of Black-billed Cuckoos in the range 
of 100 per hour for at least a few hours in the middle of the night. This was 
not a call total but a rate of vocal birds estimated by following multiple 
calls from apparently the same individual, and it was clear that these birds 
were migrants heading northbound. In 1988-1990 I began recording nocturnal 
flight calls each fall migration period in early July around Ithaca, NY and was 
surprised that in each season the highest rate of BBCU calling was in July 
through early August. There seemed to be a lot of variability in the number of 
calls I recorded between proximal nights, which could be a function of 
weather/wind and microphone pickup dynamics or that the birds tended to prefer 
some nights over others. In the big passerine push from mid –August through 
mid-September across central NY, BBCU flight calls are less common than one 
might expect. Using a Sennheiser shotgun mic back in those days, my rates of 
BBCU nocturnal flight call detection in the latter half of August were in the 
1-2 per hour range (averaged over whole night). In the first half of September 
rates dropped to the range of one call every four hours. Whereas in July 
through early August it was common to record sustained rate through the night 
of 4-5 per hour. But as I mentioned there was a lot of variability from night 
to night.

I haven’t recorded much in June in central NY, but my impression has been that 
the breeding ground flight calling,  the “mid-summer, mid-night, mid-sky, 
gyrations”,  is a phenomenon that increases in July.

Bill E  
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Re: [nfc-l] migrating cuckoos

[Michael O'Brien]

Ken, 


You may have been hearing a push of migrants, but I wonder if these birds could 
have been moving around locally. I've quite often heard cuckoos, particularly 
Black-billed, give nocturnal flight calls in midsummer (June and July) and I 
suspect these are birds moving locally. It's hard to know of course, but even 
in May I often feel like some of the cuckoos I hear overhead are locals. One 
big day trick for getting Black-billed Cuckoo at night is to listen in good 
breeding habitat. Whether that works because they are locals or because 
migrants call more often over good habitat I don't know, but it does seem to 
work. It would be interesting to do some summer monitoring to see what patterns 
emerge. 


best, 
Michael 


Michael O'Brien 
Victor Emanuel Nature Tours 
www.ventbird.com 
- Original Message -
From: "Kenneth Victor Rosenberg"  
To: "CAYUGABIRDS-L"  
Cc: "NFC-L"  
Sent: Wednesday, June 6, 2012 11:10:30 PM 
Subject: [nfc-l] migrating cuckoos 

I was surprised to step out in my driveway (Ithaca NY) this evening and hear 4 
BLACK-BILLED CUCKOOS in 15 minutes (3 in the first 5 minutes). Maybe caught the 
tail end of a migration burst, but at least some mysterious migrants are 
continuing to move at night. 

KEN 


Ken Rosenberg 
Conservation Science Program 
Cornell Lab of Ornithology 
607-254-2412 
607-342-4594 (cell) 
k...@cornell.edu 


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Re: [nfc-l] migrating cuckoos

[Christopher T. Tessaglia-Hymes]

I've been recording and then hand browsing most nights this spring. Even on 
crummy nights with drizzle or light north winds, at least one Black-billed 
Cuckoo vocalized each night. Total Black-billed Cuckoo calls (some are 
duplicate birds heard calling twice as they pass over, once distant and once 
clearly audible) over Etna, NY thus far (including some partial song notes) is: 
190. Total Yellow-billed Cuckoo migrant songs or song fragments over Etna, NY 
thus far is: 41 - these birds seem to clearly sing only once and cannot be 
heard repeating again. Most nights I don't seem to start recording until 10:00 
or 11:00pm, just due to personal logistics, so I know I've missed some birds 
moving earlier in the night, soon after end of civil twilight. Lots of other 
cool migrants have been able to be picked up including many Alder Flycatchers 
and multiple probable Willow Flycatchers, plus several migrant Virginia Rails 
and at least two Soras. A few Swainson's Thrushes and an occasional 
Gray-cheeked Thrush are still heard migrating (as of last night). It's been 
really neat hand browsing these data; I've saved clips of lots of interesting 
and unidentified bird sounds, including shorebirds. Quiet nights can be hand 
browsed in about 45 minutes, but busier nights from earlier in the spring could 
take upwards of 3-4 hours (because I'm selecting and saving all audio clips).

Sincerely,
Chris T-H

On Jun 6, 2012, at 11:10 PM, Kenneth Victor Rosenberg wrote:

I was surprised to step out in my driveway (Ithaca NY) this evening and hear 4 
BLACK-BILLED CUCKOOS in 15 minutes (3 in the first 5 minutes). Maybe caught the 
tail end of a migration burst, but at least some mysterious migrants are 
continuing to move at night.

KEN


Ken Rosenberg
Conservation Science Program
Cornell Lab of Ornithology
607-254-2412
607-342-4594 (cell)
k...@cornell.edu


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Christopher T. Tessaglia-Hymes
TARU Product Line Manager and Field Applications Engineer
Bioacoustics Research Program, Cornell Lab of Ornithology
159 Sapsucker Woods Road, Ithaca, New York 14850
W: 607-254-2418   M: 607-351-5740   F: 607-254-1132
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[nfc-l] migrating cuckoos

[Kenneth Victor Rosenberg]

I was surprised to step out in my driveway (Ithaca NY) this evening and hear 4 
BLACK-BILLED CUCKOOS in 15 minutes (3 in the first 5 minutes). Maybe caught the 
tail end of a migration burst, but at least some mysterious migrants are 
continuing to move at night.

KEN


Ken Rosenberg
Conservation Science Program
Cornell Lab of Ornithology
607-254-2412
607-342-4594 (cell)
k...@cornell.edu


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