Loud Cuckooland

You can blame the male bird for that haunting chant, explains Pip Webster

You are more likely to hear a wandering voice, … no bird, but an invisible thing than see a shy cuckoo, according to Wordsworth.

The return of this migrant from Africa is eagerly awaited from mid-April but the resonant ‘cu-coo’ is heard much less frequently than in the past.

It is the male that sings its name throughout May (the female issues a more subdued liquid bubbling sound) before falling silent in June.

The cuckoo is a long-tailed, hawk-like grey bird – slightly bigger than a collared dove – with barred underparts and bright yellow eyes. It flies low with shallow, fast wing beats: the wings are not raised above the level of the body, though the head is held up.

You may see a female, perched horizontally with drooping wings, near a reedbed, carefully watching the nesting activities of reed warblers.

She has a sinister motive, being a ‘brood parasite’ of dunnocks and meadow pipits as well as the reed warbler.