Sirkeer malkoha
| Sirkeer malkoha | |
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| Species: | P. leschenaultii
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| Binomial name | |
| Phaenicophaeus leschenaultii (Lesson, 1830)
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Taccocua leschenaultii | |
The sirkeer malkoha or sirkeer cuckoo (Phaenicophaeus leschenaultii), is a member of the cuckoo order of birds, the Cuculiformes, which also includes the roadrunners, the anis, and the hoatzin. It is a resident bird in the Indian subcontinent.
Distribution
All of the sub-Himalayan Indian subcontinent, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka; patchy in Pakistan and Rajasthan. Sometimes considered as three races, varying in colouration.
Description
- Size: A largish bird at 42 cm.
- Appearance: Mainly earthy brown and rufous in colour, and the long heavy tail is edged with prominently white tipped graduated cross-rayed tail feathers. An obvious relation of the coucal (crow pheasant).[2] Bill is hooked, bright cherry-red and yellow. Sexes are similar, but juveniles are duller and barred above.
- Habitat: Largely terrestrial, open scrub and thorn jungle, deciduous secondary jungle. Singly or in pairs.
- Behaviour: Stalks about amongst thickets like crow-pheasant, searching for food; insects, lizards, fallen fruits and berries, etc. Runs swiftly through undergrowth looking like mongoose. Feeble flier, but ascends trees rapidly, hopping from branch to branch with great agility, like the coucal.
- Call: Normally a subdued "bzuk... bzuk" ; also an alarm call of "p'tang" with a metallic quality.[3]
- Food: A variety of insects, caterpillars and small vertebrates. It occasionally eats berries.[4]
Nesting
This cuckoo, like other malkohas, is non-parasitic.
- Season - March to August (varying with latitude)
- Nest: a shallow saucer of twigs lined with green leaves, in a thorn bush such as Euphorbia, or sapling 2 to 7 m up.
- Eggs: 2 or 3, white, with a chalky texture.
The scientific name of this bird commemorates the French botanist Jean Baptiste Leschenault de la Tour.
Gallery
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head shape -
at Hyderabad, India
References
- ^ Template:IUCN
- ^ Ali, Salim; Sidney Dillon Ripley (2001) [1986]. Handbook of the Birds of India and Pakistan, 2nd ed.,10 vols (2nd ed.). New Delhi: Oxford University Press.Bird Number 598
- ^ Ali, Salim; J C Daniel (1983). The book of Indian Birds, Twelfth Centenary edition. New Delhi: Bombay Natural History Society/Oxford University Press.
- ^ Grimmett, Richard; Inskipp, Carol; Inskipp, Tim (1998). Guide to the Birds of Indian Subcontinent. London: Christopher Helm. ISBN 978-1-4081-2763-6.