99 



THE CUCKOO: A STUDY.* 



Rev. EDWARD ADRIAN WOODRUFFE-PEACOCK, L.Th., F.L.S., F.G.S., 



Vicar of Cadney; Organising and Botanical Secretary, Lincolnshire Naturalists' Union. 



A school examiner once asked a little girl, ' What do you 

 know about the Cuckoo ? ' and received the unexpected answer, 

 'Please, sir, it doesn't lay its own eggs, sir.' We should not 

 all be so forward in communicating- any information we may 

 possess, but on many points, I fear, it would hardly be more 

 accurate ; so I make no apology in introducing the Cuckoo 

 (Cuculus canorus Linn.) as one of our subjects this evening. 

 I once gave up three spring and summer months to the 

 study of the life-history of this bird, by daylight in the fields 

 and by night in copses and woods and the library, and have 

 ever since taken great interest in any information regarding 

 it. These notes, however, do not all claim to be original as 

 observations, or even in the language in which they are 

 expressed, for I have freely borrowed from my predecessors; 

 but, though it is quite, impossible for me to state who first 

 recorded all the known facts, I hope you will bear patiently with 

 me while I enter sometimes a little fully into detail. Notwith- 

 standing all the literature devoted to the Cuckoo, which is 

 without doubt the most interesting bird that visits this country 

 for nesting purposes, little is known of many of its more 

 intimate peculiarities. Almost anyone, who has the opportunity 

 and will give time and patience to the subject, could by careful 

 observation add many exact facts to our present knowledge, or 

 settle some much-disputed point in the domestic economy of 

 this parasitical t bird. I do not mean by using the gun, and 

 Studying them in the flesh; all that can be found out in that 

 waj is known already; but rather by watching their habits in 

 the perfectly free .state of nature, and unravelling in this way 



* Being a portion of a lecture delivered by request in the Church House, 

 Lincoln, on 7th November 1S93, and at Louth, 23rd February 1899, before 

 the Louth Antiquarian and Naturalists' Society, w ith later notes added to 

 bring 1 the whole up to date for next season's observations. 



t Another parasitical bird, the so-called Cow-bird {Molobrus)^ ol North 

 America, succeeds in getting rid ol' the offspring of the foster-parents. 

 A friend of mine informs me that, according to an American newspaper- 

 cutting, which was sent to her some years ago, the Cow-bird visits her 

 young one- after it has been hatched, and continues to watch over it for 

 some time. Will some ornithologist, within reach of a good reference 

 library, look up this matter and give me the result of his researches? 



1900 April 3. , 



