84 BULLETIN 17 6, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



is preserved in the Museum of the University of Pisa ; and one was 

 taken on September 25, 1871, at Killead, County Antrim, Ireland. 



Egg dates. — Illinois: 13 records, May 7 to July 20; 7 records, 

 June 1 to 26, indicating the height of the season. 



Massachusetts: 20 records, May 19 to June 20; 10 records. May 30 

 to June 10. 



Michigan : 14 records, May 25 to September 14 ; 7 records, June 21 

 to July 20. 



New York: 23 records. May 11 to July 18; 12 records. May 29 

 to June 9. 



CUCULUS OPTATUS OPTATUS Gould 



HIMALAYAN CUCKOO 



Contributed by Edward Charles Stuart Baker 



HABITS 



The Himalayan cuckoo very closely resembles the various races 

 of the common cuckoo {Cu€iilus canorus) in its general habits, but it 

 is, I think, a more secretive bird, keeping closely to tall trees with 

 dense foliage, so that although one may hear its very distinctive 

 call on many occasions quite close by it is often y^vy difficult to see 

 until it takes to wing. In Kashmir and the northwest Himalayas 

 it is found in summer at all elevations between 5,000 and 10,000 feet 

 and occasionally to some 2,000 feet higher but, never, I believe, above 

 the forest line. In Sikkim it is common in well-forested land be- 

 tween 4,000 and 9,000 feet, while Stevens (1925) records having heard 

 it calling at an elevation of 3,500 feet on May 25, so that it may 

 breed as low down as this in that part of the Himalayas. In Assam 

 it is very common between the same elevations as in Sikkim, there 

 also keeping closely to forest, either deciduous, pine, or evergreen 

 with dense undergrowth. All ornithologists seem to agree as to the 

 nature of the country frequented by this cuckoo. In letters to me 

 A. E. Jones mentions "dense forest," "dense deodar forest" as the 

 breeding haunts of birds whose eggs he has found; B. B. Osmaston 

 (MS.) found it in "open, well-wooded forest." Mackenzie and Hop- 

 wood (MS.) took eggs in the nests of Acanthopneuste davisoni in 

 the Chin Hills, in "heavy evergreen forest." The only exception to 

 this of which I am aware is an egg taken by T. R. Livesey (MS.) 

 found in Kashmir in a nest of Emhenza cia stracheyi in a "well- 

 wooded glade in forest." 



At all seasons of the year it keeps almost entirely to branches of 

 high trees, some 40 or 50 feet or more from the ground, descending 

 to the undergrowth only when hunting for nests in which to deposit 

 its eggs or for the actual deposition of the &gg. When so em- 



