''Coccyzus'' is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

cuckoo 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 separ ...

s which occur in the

Americas The Americas, which are sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North and South America. The Americas make up most of the land in Earth's Western Hemisphere and comprise the New World. Along with th ...

. The genus name is from

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

''kokkuzo'', which means to call like a

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. I ...

. The genus includes the lizard cuckoos that were formerly included in the genus ''Saurothera''.

Taxonomy

The genus ''Coccyzus'' was introduced in 1816 by the French ornithologist

Louis Jean Pierre Vieillot Louis Pierre Vieillot (10 May 1748, Yvetot – 24 August 1830, Sotteville-lès-Rouen) was a French ornithologist. Vieillot is the author of the first scientific descriptions and Linnaean names of a number of birds, including species he collecte ...

to accommodate a single species, Comte de Buffon's "Coucou de la Caroline", now the

yellow-billed cuckoo The yellow-billed cuckoo (''Coccyzus americanus'') is a cuckoo. Common folk-names for this bird in the southern United States are rain crow and storm crow. These likely refer to the bird's habit of calling on hot days, often presaging rain or th ...

. This which is therefore the

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

. The genus name is from the

''kokkuzō'' meaning "to cry cuckoo". The results of a

molecular phylogenetic Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to ...

study of the cuckoo family by Michael Sorenson and Robert Payne that was published in 2005 lead to a reorganization of some of the genera. Based on this study, the genera ''Saurothera'' (the lizard cuckoos) and ''Hyetornis'' (chestnut-bellied and bay-breasted cuckoos) were lumped with ''Coccyzus'' while the

ash-colored cuckoo The ash-colored cuckoo (''Coccycua cinerea'') is an American bird species of the cuckoo family (Cuculidae). It was formerly placed in the genus ''Coccyzus'' or ''Micrococcyx''. Following the discovery that it belongs to a distinct lineage around ...

and

dwarf cuckoo The dwarf cuckoo (''Coccycua pumila'') is a tropical American bird species of the cuckoo family (Cuculidae). It was formerly placed in the genus ''Coccyzus'' or ''Micrococcyx''. Following the discovery that it belongs to a distinct lineage aroun ...

, at one time separated in ''Micrococcyx'', were found to be closest relatives of the

little cuckoo The little cuckoo (''Coccycua minuta'') is a species of bird in the cuckoo family (Cuculidae) from South America and Panama. It was formerly placed in the genus ''Piaya'', but was moved to the reinstated genus ''Coccycua'' following the discovery ...

, formerly in ''

Piaya ''Piaya'' is a small genus of relatively large and long-tailed cuckoos, which occur in Mexico, Central America and South America. The two species in taxonomic order are: The little cuckoo has been found to be closer to some species traditiona ...

''. These three species were placed in the resurrected genus ''

Coccycua ''Coccycua'' is a small genus of birds in the cuckoo family, Cuculidae. Its three species are found in the tropical Americas. Formerly, they were divided among in ''Coccyzus'' (two species) and ''Piaya'' (one species), or the former were assig ...

''.

Species

The genus contains 13 species:

Description and ecology

These

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 lightweigh ...

s are of variable size with slender bodies, long tails and strong legs. Many have black and white undertail patterns. They occur in a variety of forests, woodlands or

mangrove A mangrove is a shrub or tree that grows in coastal saline water, saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. Mangroves are taxonomically diverse, as a result of convergent evoluti ...

s. ''Coccyzus'' cuckoos, unlike many

Old World The "Old World" is a term for Afro-Eurasia that originated in Europe , after Europeans became aware of the existence of the Americas. It is used to contrast the continents of Africa, Europe, and Asia, which were previously thought of by the ...

species, build their own nests in trees and lay two or more eggs. Yellow-billed and

black-billed cuckoo The black-billed cuckoo (''Coccyzus erythropthalmus'') is a New World species in the Cuculidae (cuckoo) family. The scientific name is from Ancient Greek. The genus name, ''kokkuzo'', means to call like a common cuckoo, and ''erythropthalmus'' i ...

s occasionally lay

egg An egg is an organic vessel grown by an animal to carry a possibly fertilized egg cell (a zygote) and to incubate from it an embryo within the egg until the embryo has become an animal fetus that can survive on its own, at which point the a ...

s in the nests of other birds, but are not obligate

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 ...

s like the

of Eurasia. Northern species such as yellow-billed and black-billed cuckoos are strong migrants, wintering in

Central Central is an adjective usually referring to being in the center of some place or (mathematical) object. Central may also refer to: Directions and generalised locations * Central Africa, a region in the centre of Africa continent, also known as ...

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...

, and occasionally wander to western

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

as rare vagrants, but the tropical ''Coccyzus'' cuckoos are mainly sedentary. These are vocal species when breeding, with persistent and loud calls. They feed on large

insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs ...

s such as

cicada The cicadas () are a superfamily, the Cicadoidea, of insects in the order Hemiptera (true bugs). They are in the suborder Auchenorrhyncha, along with smaller jumping bugs such as leafhoppers and froghoppers. The superfamily is divided into two ...

wasp A wasp is any insect of the narrow-waisted suborder Apocrita of the order Hymenoptera which is neither a bee nor an ant; this excludes the broad-waisted sawflies (Symphyta), which look somewhat like wasps, but are in a separate suborder. Th ...

s and

caterpillar Caterpillars ( ) are the larval stage of members of the order Lepidoptera (the insect order comprising butterflies and moths). As with most common names, the application of the word is arbitrary, since the larvae of sawflies (suborder Sym ...

s (including those with stinging hairs or spines which are distasteful to many birds). Lizard cuckoos are large and powerful species, and mainly take

vertebrate Vertebrates () comprise all animal taxa within the subphylum Vertebrata () ( chordates with backbones), including all mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish. Vertebrates represent the overwhelming majority of the phylum Chordata, ...

prey, especially, as the name implies,

lizard Lizards are a widespread group of squamate reptiles, with over 7,000 species, ranging across all continents except Antarctica, as well as most oceanic island chains. The group is paraphyletic since it excludes the snakes and Amphisbaenia alt ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q592593 Bird genera * Taxa named by Louis Jean Pierre Vieillot