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Cuckoos
Cuckoos are birds in the Cuculidae family, the sole taxon in the order Cuculiformes . The cuckoo family includes the common or European cuckoo, roadrunners, koels, malkohas, couas, coucals and anis. The coucals and anis are sometimes separated as distinct families, the Centropodidae and Crotophagidae respectively. The cuckoo order Cuculiformes is one of three that make up the Otidimorphae, the other two being the turacos and the bustards. The family Cuculidae contains 150 species which are divided into 33 genera. The cuckoos are generally medium-sized slender birds. Most species live in trees, though a sizeable minority are ground-dwelling. The family has a cosmopolitan distribution; the majority of species are tropical. Some species are migratory. The cuckoos feed on insects, insect larvae and a variety of other animals, as well as fruit. Some species are brood parasites, laying their eggs in the nests of other species and giving rise to the metaphor ''cuckoo's egg'', b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Common Cuckoo
The common cuckoo (''Cuculus canorus'') is a member of the cuckoo order of birds, Cuculiformes, which includes the roadrunners, the anis and the coucals. This species is a widespread summer migrant to Europe and Asia, and winters in Africa. It is a brood parasite, which means it lays eggs in the nests of other bird species, particularly of dunnocks, meadow pipits, and reed warblers. Although its eggs are larger than those of its hosts, the eggs in each type of host nest resemble the host's eggs. The adult too is a mimic, in its case of the sparrowhawk; since that species is a predator, the mimicry gives the female time to lay her eggs without being attacked. Taxonomy The species' binomial name is derived from the Latin ''cuculus'' (the cuckoo) and ''canorus'' (melodious; from ''canere'', meaning to sing). The cuckoo family gets its common name and genus name by onomatopoeia for the call of the male common cuckoo. The English word "cuckoo" comes from the Old French ''cucu'', ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brood Parasite
Brood parasites are animals that rely on others to raise their young. The strategy appears among birds, insects and fish. The brood parasite manipulates a host, either of the same or of another species, to raise its young as if it were its own, usually using egg mimicry, with eggs that resemble the host's. The evolutionary strategy relieves the parasitic parents from the investment of rearing young. This benefit comes at the cost of provoking an evolutionary arms race between parasite and host as they coevolve: many hosts have developed strong defenses against brood parasitism, such as recognizing and ejecting parasitic eggs, or abandoning parasitized nests and starting over. It is less obvious why most hosts do care for parasite nestlings, given that for example cuckoo chicks differ markedly from host chicks in size and appearance. One explanation, the mafia hypothesis, proposes that parasitic adults retaliate by destroying host nests where rejection has occurred; there is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bird
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweight skeleton. Birds live worldwide and range in size from the bee hummingbird to the ostrich. There are about ten thousand living species, more than half of which are passerine, or "perching" birds. Birds have whose development varies according to species; the only known groups without wings are the extinct moa and elephant birds. Wings, which are modified forelimbs, gave birds the ability to fly, although further evolution has led to the loss of flight in some birds, including ratites, penguins, and diverse endemic island species. The digestive and respiratory systems of birds are also uniquely adapted for flight. Some bird species of aquatic environments, particularly seabirds and some waterbirds, have further evolved for swimming. B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cuculus
''Cuculus'' is a genus of cuckoos which has representatives in most of the Old World, although the greatest diversity is in tropical southern and southeastern Asia. Taxonomy The genus ''Cuculus'' was introduced in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his '' Systema Naturae''. The genus name is the Latin word for "cuckoo". The type species is the common cuckoo (''Cuculus canorus''). Species The genus contains 11 species: * Black cuckoo, ''Cuculus clamosus'' * Red-chested cuckoo, ''Cuculus solitarius'' * Lesser cuckoo, ''Cuculus poliocephalus'' * Sulawesi cuckoo or Sulawesi hawk-cuckoo, ''Cuculus crassirostris'' * Indian cuckoo, ''Cuculus micropterus'' * Madagascar cuckoo, ''Cuculus rochii'' * African cuckoo, ''Cuculus gularis'' * Himalayan cuckoo, ''Cuculus saturatus'' * Oriental cuckoo, ''Cuculus optatus'' (formerly ''horsfieldi'') (split from ''C. saturatus'') * Sunda cuckoo, ''Cuculus lepidus'' (split from ''C. saturatus'') * Common cuckoo, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Turaco
The turacos make up the bird family Musophagidae ( "banana-eaters"), which includes plantain-eaters and go-away-birds. In southern Africa both turacos and go-away-birds are commonly known as loeries. They are semi-zygodactylous: the fourth (outer) toe can be switched back and forth. The second and third toes, which always point forward, are conjoined in some species. Musophagids often have prominent crests and long tails; the turacos are noted for peculiar and unique pigments giving them their bright green and red feathers. Traditionally, this group has been allied with the cuckoos in the order Cuculiformes, but the Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy raises this group to a full order Musophagiformes. They have been proposed to link the hoatzin to the other living birds, but this was later disputed. Recent genetic analyses have strongly supported the order ranking of Musophagiformes. Musophagidae is one of very few bird families endemic to Africa, one other being the mousebirds, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coua
Couas are large, mostly terrestrial birds of the cuckoo family, endemic to the island of Madagascar. Couas are reminiscent of African turacos when walking along tree branches, and they likewise feature brightly coloured bare skin around the eyes. Some resemble coucals in their habit of clambering through jungle while foraging, while the arboreal species move between tree canopies with gliding flight. Four species have been recorded in rainforests while the remaining six are found in the dry forests of western and southern Madagascar. They have large feet, with a reversible third toe like all cuckoos. Their long tibia suggest a relationship with the ''Carpococcyx'' ground-cuckoos of Asia, a genus with similar nestlings. Consequently, they are sometimes united in the subfamily ''Couinae''. Couas build their own nests and lay white eggs. Couas' calls are a short series of evenly-spaced notes, which are sometimes answered by other individuals. Taxonomy The genus ''Coua'' was erec ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Koel
The true koels, ''Eudynamys'', are a genus of cuckoos from Asia, Australia and the Pacific. They are large sexually dimorphic cuckoos that eat fruits and insects and have loud distinctive calls. They are brood parasites, laying their eggs in the nests of other species. Taxonomy The genus ''Eudynamys'' was introduced in 1827 by the English naturalists Nicholas Vigors and Thomas Horsfield. The name combines the Ancient Greek ''eu'' meaning "fine" with ''dunamis'' meaning "power" or "strength". The type species was designated as the Pacific koel by George Robert Gray in 1840. A molecular genetic study by Sorenson and Payne (2005) found that the closest relative of ''Eudynamys'' is the dwarf koel (''Microdynamis parva''), and beyond that the thick-billed cuckoo (''Pachycoccyx audeberti''). They found that the long-tailed cuckoo (''Urodynamis taitensis'') of New Zealand and the Pacific, which had earlier been placed in ''Eudynamys'' as ''E. taitensis'' and sometimes called the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bird Migration
Bird migration is the regular seasonal movement, often north and south along a flyway, between breeding and wintering grounds. Many species of bird migrate. Migration carries high costs in predation and mortality, including from hunting by humans, and is driven primarily by the availability of food. It occurs mainly in the northern hemisphere, where birds are funneled onto specific routes by natural barriers such as the Mediterranean Sea or the Caribbean Sea. Migration of species such as storks, turtle doves, and swallows was recorded as many as 3,000 years ago by Ancient Greek authors, including Homer and Aristotle, and in the Book of Job. More recently, Johannes Leche began recording dates of arrivals of spring migrants in Finland in 1749, and modern scientific studies have used techniques including bird ringing and satellite tracking to trace migrants. Threats to migratory birds have grown with habitat destruction, especially of stopover and wintering sites, as wel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coucal
A coucal is one of about 30 species of birds in the cuckoo family. All of them belong in the subfamily Centropodinae and the genus ''Centropus''. Unlike many Old World cuckoos, coucals are not brood parasites, though they do have their own reproductive peculiarity: all members of the genus are (to varying degrees) sex-role reversed, so that the smaller male provides most of the parental care. At least one coucal species, the black coucal, is polyandrous. Some species (''Centropus phasianinus'') have the male investing more in incubation and parental care. Taxonomy The genus ''Centropus'' was introduced in 1811 by the German zoologist Johann Karl Wilhelm Illiger. The type species was subsequently designated as the Senegal coucal by George Robert Gray in 1840. The genus name combines the Ancient Greek ''kentron'' meaning "spur" or "spike" with ''pous'' meaning "foot". Description Many coucals have a long claw on their hind toe (hallux). The feet have minute spurs and this is res ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ani (bird)
The anis are the three species of birds in the genus ''Crotophaga'' of the cuckoo family. They are essentially tropical New World birds, although the range of two species just reaches the United States.Payne, R.B. (2005). ''The Cuckoos''. Oxford University Press. Unlike some cuckoos, the anis are not brood parasites, but nest communally, the cup nest being built by several pairs from 2–6 m high in a tree. A number of females lay their eggs in the nest and then share incubation and feeding. The anis are large black birds with a long tail and a deep ridged black bill. Their flight is weak and wobbly, but they run well, and usually feed on the ground. These are very gregarious species, always found in noisy groups. Anis feed on termites, large insects, and even lizards and frogs. The claim that they will remove ticks and other parasites from grazing animals has been disputed; while there is no doubt that anis follow grazing animals to catch disturbed insects and will occa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Otidimorphae
The Otidimorphae is a clade of birds that contains the orders Cuculiformes (cuckoos), Musophagiformes (turacos), and Otidiformes (bustards) identified in 2014 by genome analysis. While the bustards seem to be related to the turaco The turacos make up the bird family Musophagidae ( "banana-eaters"), which includes plantain-eaters and go-away-birds. In southern Africa both turacos and go-away-birds are commonly known as loeries. They are semi-zygodactylous: the fourth ( ...s, other genetic studies have found the cuckoos to be closer to the bustards than the turacos are. References Neognathae {{bird-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cuckoo's Egg (metaphor)
A cuckoo's egg is a metaphor for brood parasitism, where a parasitic bird deposits its egg into a host's nest, which then incubates and feeds the chick that hatches, even at the expense of its own offspring. That original biological meaning has been extended to other uses, including one which references spyware and other pieces of malware. History The concept has been in use in the study of brood parasitism in birds since the 19th century. It first evolved a metaphoric meaning of "misplaced trust", wherein the chick hatched of a cuckoo's egg incubated and raised by unknowing victim parents will first begin to starve and outgrow them as it or they kill off the birds' legitimate offspring. The first well known application to spycraft was in the 1989 book '' The Cuckoo's Egg: Tracking a Spy Through the Maze of Computer Espionage'' by Clifford Stoll, in which Stoll deployed a honeypot to catch a cyber hacker that had accessed the secure computer system of the classified U.S. go ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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