CL'CULID.E. 121 



Suborder COCCYGES. 

 Family CUCULID^. 



Cuckoo. Cuculus canorus, Linn. 

 [Gowk, Gawk, Gookoo : Dev.l 



A summer migrant, common throughout the county. 



'• Cuckoo ! cuckoo ! " This welcome voice of the spring is to be heard 

 very generally in the West Country, where moor, and hill, and woodland 

 afford the strange bird with which it is identical just the land it loves. 

 In some years, as in 1873 and 1881, it is very numerous. It arrives 

 usually in the third or fourth week of April in the southern part of 

 Devon. The earliest dates at which it was first heard near Exeter, 

 within our own knowledge extending over the last forty years, are as 

 follows:— Cth April, 18G4 and 1872; 7th April 1874 and 1882; 9th 

 April, 1884. Polwhele records that a Cuckoo was heard on 10th January, 

 1770, near Mount Edgcumbe, and in that month in several parts of the 

 South Hams, it being an extraordinarily mild season {cf. Gent. Mag. 

 vol. 06, p. 117). One is said to have been heard and seen at Stoke 

 Canon, near Exeter, March 27th, 1872; and Mr. M. V. Toll distinctly 

 heard the Cuckoo on the afternoon of March 10th, 1884, at Strete, near 

 Dartmouth, and saw the bird flying towards him. It passed over his 

 head at not more than twenty yards high, calling as it tlew (' Field ' for 

 March loth, 1884). 



In the extreme west of Somerset the IGth April goes by the name of 

 " Cuckoo's Day," it being the date when the cry of the Cuckoo may first 

 be expected. And we have found that this is a very fair average date. 

 Once or twice we have heard the Cuckoo on April 13th ; but in most years 

 the bird does not reveal its presence until April 10th, or some day in the 

 week following, and if cold, dry weather with jS'.E. winds prevails about 

 that time, the Cuckoo, altliough arrived in the district, will keep silent. 

 In ver}' backward and cold springs we have known even the month of 

 May, when, as the line goes, " it sings all day," to pass without his note 

 enlivening the wintry scene. The Cuckoo is most vociferous in soft, 

 balmy weather, especially after a warm shower, as the old country people 

 say, " he likes a drop to moisten his throat." Wc have, after late springs, 

 heard the Cuckoo on 1st or 2nd July ; but it is very rare to hear tlie bird 

 cry after Midsummer Day, and in some years wc have listened in vain 

 for it after 10th June. 



Directly she arrives the female Cuckoo proceeds to lay, and wc have 

 found young Cuckoos strung on wing by the cud of May ; while wo have 

 Kcen others, evidently not long from tlie nest, as late as J 0th September, 

 proving that the Cuckoo continues to lay up to the time of her departure 

 Irom this country. The adult Ijirds appear to leave tlic county e.irly in 

 July, but birds of the year rcnniin till late in autumn. A\'e liad "piitc a 



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