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Cuckoo calling - is it common to hear them?

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Comments

  • #2
    Scotty #
    Registered Users Posts: 3,767 ✭✭✭Scotty #


    Unfortunately quite rare now in Ireland. Heard one once about 40 years ago while on holidays at my grans in remote Co. Kerry.


  • #3
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 5,121 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Seemingly loads of them around me, luckily.
    Just north of Galway city, by a bog.

    I think I just saw one being chased by a couple of crows. Would crows chase one off?

    It was bigger than a blackbird, greyish brown and flying with its tail down.


  • #4
    fryup
    Registered Users Posts: 18,069 ✭✭✭✭fryup


    Scotty # wrote: »
    Unfortunately quite rare now in Ireland.

    really :confused: hear them every year here in east-clare

    *maybe its the curlew you're thinking of


  • #5
    Teyla Emmagan
    Registered Users Posts: 5,641 ✭✭✭Teyla Emmagan


    The cuckoo reached Glenties in Donegal about 3 weeks ago according to Granny. She is 99 this month and claims it was late this year, she didn't think it was coming.


  • #6
    Rows Grower
    Registered Users Posts: 7,816 ✭✭✭Rows Grower


    They're back here every year around the same time in south Kerry, beautiful bird to hear.

    Sometimes I think the cuckoo and the pheasant around here are having a competition to outdo one another, usually short intervals between each of the calls.

    "Very soon we are going to Mars. You wouldn't have been going to Mars if my opponent won, that I can tell you. You wouldn't even be thinking about it."

    Donald Trump, March 13th 2018.



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  • #7
    endainoz
    Registered Users Posts: 4,690 ✭✭✭endainoz


    Mid to late April is always the time for cuckoo in North Clare anyway, glad to say they aren't rare around here.


  • #8
    DBB
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 9,726 Mod ✭✭✭✭DBB


    They're spring/summer visitors here, they come here to breed. They usually arrive April, and can be heard calling in April and May as the males search for a mate. You just won't hear them at other times of the year as they're either finished mating, or they're just not here!
    Crows will certainly chase them off... they parasitise the nests of small birds by throwing the eggs laid by the small bird out of their nest, and laying their own egg in there instead for the small birds to rear the cuckoo chick. Whether they do this to crows I don't know... seems unlikely but perhaps not impossible? Crows will chase off any bird of prey or perceived threat... perhaps they just don't like cuckoos because they look different to what the crows are used to throughout the rest of the year? Happy for a more knowledgeable bird person to fill in the gaps here! :)


  • #9
    Rodin
    Registered Users Posts: 3,130 ✭✭✭Rodin


    Been hearing them daily for about the last month. Occasionally two at once


  • #10
    Westernyelp
    Registered Users Posts: 2,371 ✭✭✭Westernyelp


    Fairly common sound in Mayo to be heard. All through the years including this year


  • #11
    DBB
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 9,726 Mod ✭✭✭✭DBB


    Have heard them in a couple of different areas of north Offaly too. They did seem a little later than usual this year.


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  • #12
    Scotty #
    Registered Users Posts: 3,767 ✭✭✭Scotty #


    Delighted to hear they are so common in some parts. I was under the impression their numbers were in serious decline.

    I've never heard one in Dublin/Meath :-(


  • #13
    DBB
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators Posts: 9,726 Mod ✭✭✭✭DBB


    Scotty # wrote: »
    Delighted to hear they are so common in some parts. I was under the impression their numbers were in serious decline.

    I've never heard one in Dublin/Meath :-(

    They always seem to prefer really rural, wild, open, uninhabited places, like bogs, or cleared forest plantations on mountainsides... I'm basing this entirely on my own experience! As a Dub who migrated to the Midlands, I had never heard one when I lived in Dublin either, even in what were then rural parts of the county. Never heard them when I lived in Louth either, now that I think of it!


  • #14
    Alun
    Registered Users Posts: 21,418 ✭✭✭✭Alun


    I've heard them often while hiking up in the Dublin Wicklow Mountains. Usually in the distance in a far off forested area.


  • #15
    Deagol
    Registered Users Posts: 1,698 ✭✭✭Deagol


    Heard one yesterday late afternoon up near Slieve Callan in Co. Clare. First one I've heard this year after moving back to a rural community.


  • #16
    cnocbui
    Registered Users Posts: 19,673 ✭✭✭✭cnocbui


    Deleted User wrote: »
    Seemingly loads of them around me, luckily.
    Just north of Galway city, by a bog.

    I think I just saw one being chased by a couple of crows. Would crows chase one off?

    It was bigger than a blackbird, greyish brown and flying with its tail down.

    If I were a crow, I'd be attempting to do more harm than just chasing it off. Cuckoos may sound pleasant but their breeding habits are despicable. I know that's anthropomorphising it, but they are a nasty parasite in terms of other birds.

    I have heard plenty in Galway and Tipp.


  • #17
    endainoz
    Registered Users Posts: 4,690 ✭✭✭endainoz


    cnocbui wrote: »
    If I were a crow, I'd be attempting to do more harm than just chasing it off. Cuckoos may sound pleasant but their breeding habits are despicable. I know that's anthropomorphising it, but they are a nasty parasite in terms of other birds.

    I have heard plenty in Galway and Tipp.

    The bouldness of the cuckoo always has a mystique about them though. A good indication of the summer coming and they are associated with that.


  • #18
    OpenYourEyes
    Moderators, Recreation & Hobbies Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators Posts: 3,068 Mod ✭✭✭✭OpenYourEyes


    DBB wrote: »
    They're spring/summer visitors here, they come here to breed. They usually arrive April, and can be heard calling in April and May as the males search for a mate. You just won't hear them at other times of the year as they're either finished mating, or they're just not here!
    Crows will certainly chase them off... they parasitise the nests of small birds by throwing the eggs laid by the small bird out of their nest, and laying their own egg in there instead for the small birds to rear the cuckoo chick. Whether they do this to crows I don't know... seems unlikely but perhaps not impossible? Crows will chase off any bird of prey or perceived threat... perhaps they just don't like cuckoos because they look different to what the crows are used to throughout the rest of the year? Happy for a more knowledgeable bird person to fill in the gaps here! :)

    I'd put it down to the fact that Cuckoos resemble Sparrowhawks in flight and appearance! They do that to scare small birds away to allow themselves access to their nests. In different parts of the world, the local cuckoo species resembles the local small hawk/sparrowhawk-equivalent!


  • #19
    Loozer
    Closed Accounts Posts: 168 ✭✭Loozer


    There's a bird or birds , only one, making loud sounds for years in the mornings near my house

    No idea what it is and it's certainly not music to listen to


  • #20
    fryup
    Registered Users Posts: 18,069 ✭✭✭✭fryup


    cnocbui wrote: »
    If I were a crow, I'd be attempting to do more harm than just chasing it off. Cuckoos may sound pleasant but their breeding habits are despicable. I know that's anthropomorphising it, but they are a nasty parasite in terms of other birds.

    :cool:

    they're the cute whores of the bird world....i wonder how they evolved to do that? its amazing really


  • #21
    Rows Grower
    Registered Users Posts: 7,816 ✭✭✭Rows Grower


    cnocbui wrote: »
    If I were a crow, I'd be attempting to do more harm than just chasing it off. Cuckoos may sound pleasant but their breeding habits are despicable. I know that's anthropomorphising it, but they are a nasty parasite in terms of other birds.

    I have heard plenty in Galway and Tipp.

    I have no idea what that word means or even if it is actually a word and I couldn't care less.

    I always thought Cuckoos were super cool and when a few weeks ago I got the chance to explain to my youngest lad that that was their call he could hear and their modus operandi he thought they were avian geniuses.

    "Very soon we are going to Mars. You wouldn't have been going to Mars if my opponent won, that I can tell you. You wouldn't even be thinking about it."

    Donald Trump, March 13th 2018.



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  • #22
    mossie
    Registered Users Posts: 2,149 ✭✭✭mossie


    Haven't heard one for years in rural North Cork. Did see one a couple of years ago being mobbed by crows though.


  • #23
    Doctors room ghost
    Registered Users Posts: 4,799 ✭✭✭Doctors room ghost


    The cuckoo is fierce plenty this year.find yourself a bog near a fir plantation and you’ll find it.best time for to hear them calling is late evening on a calm windless evening.
    Oceans of cuckoos this past month in Galway.
    If any of ye are stuck in Galway pm me and I’ll send ye a spot to hear it


  • #24
    EagererBeaver
    Registered Users Posts: 6,410 ✭✭✭EagererBeaver


    cnocbui wrote: »
    If I were a crow, I'd be attempting to do more harm than just chasing it off. Cuckoos may sound pleasant but their breeding habits are despicable. I know that's anthropomorphising it, but they are a nasty parasite in terms of other birds.

    I have heard plenty in Galway and Tipp.

    You think? Cuckoos are a family of birds, not a single species. The vast majority of them of raise their own young.


  • #25
    _Brian
    Registered Users Posts: 18,473 ✭✭✭✭_Brian


    We’re in east cavan.
    I remember the cuckoo when I was a child but they disappeared here maybe early 80’s

    They returned two years ago, last year we could hear three different birds calling in the afternoons. They returned here 10 days ago and are very vocal.

    There is an abundance of insects and flies in this area as it’s not intensively farmed and as a result we get plenty of birds.


  • #26
    ednwireland
    Registered Users Posts: 14,282 ✭✭✭✭ednwireland


    never shut up in the spring here in sw donegal

    My weather

    https://www.ecowitt.net/home/share?authorize=96CT1F



  • #27
    dogmatix
    Registered Users Posts: 1,404 ✭✭✭dogmatix


    I heard one calling just after sunrise last week, while walking in the woods of Carrick hill, Glenealy. Never heard one before, great to hear. Also heard a woodpecker on another morning in the same location.


  • #28
    XLR 8
    Registered Users Posts: 194 ✭✭XLR 8


    I'm on the Dublin/Wicklow border. Hear them most years up here.


  • #29
    Fr Tod Umptious
    Registered Users Posts: 15,000 ✭✭✭✭Fr Tod Umptious


    Westernyelp wrote: »
    Fairly common sound in Mayo to be heard. All through the years including this year
    Always heard the cuckoo at home in Mayo when I was young.

    Was up home last May and heard one.

    Have been living in rural Kerry for over a decade and have yet to hear one.


  • #30
    Danzy
    Registered Users Posts: 13,236 ✭✭✭✭Danzy


    Saw one last year as I was setting wild bird cover, it followed me along as I scattered the seed, first time I'd seen one, hear them most years.


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  • #31
    Danzy
    Registered Users Posts: 13,236 ✭✭✭✭Danzy


    dogmatix wrote: »
    I heard one calling just after sunrise last week, while walking in the woods of Carrick hill, Glenealy. Never heard one before, great to hear. Also heard a woodpecker on another morning in the same location.

    The Irish for Magpie is Snag Breac, the woodpecker died out in the wood clearances by the English in the mid 1600s, the magpie arrived in the 1670s and the name was transferred over due to their slight similarities.


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