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Shining Bronze Cuckoo - BirdForum Opus

Subspecies plagosus
Photo © by Tom Tarrant
Dayboro, southeast Queensland, Australia, January 2003
Chrysococcyx lucidus

Identification

Juvenile, subspecies lucidus
Photo © by quicksand
Whitford, Auckland, New Zealand, February 2014

17 cm (6¾ in)

  • Bronze-green upperparts
  • Green tail
  • Whitish face
  • White underparts with greenish-bronze barring
  • Straight, pointed beaks
  • Feet have zygodactyl toe arrangement

Distribution

Indonesia, New Caledonia, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, and Vanuatu, eastern and south-western Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand.

Taxonomy

Subspecies

There are 4 subspecies[1]:

  • C.l. harterti:
  • C.l. layardi:
  • C.l. lucidus:
  • C.l. plagosus:

Habitat

Forests, woodland and scrub, from sea-level to 1000 m.

Behaviour

Diet

Their main diet consists of insects, particularly caterpillars. They forage on the ground and in the canopy. Will join mixed species feeding flocks.

Breeding

They are a brood parasite using hosts such as thornbills, wrens, flycatchers and honeyeaters. The female lays up to 16 long, pale green to brown eggs. The eggs are laid one at a time in the nests of 16 other birds.

Vocalisation

They call with a high-pitched whistle.

References

  1. Clements, J. F., T. S. Schulenberg, M. J. Iliff, D. Roberson, T. A. Fredericks, B. L. Sullivan, and C. L. Wood. 2017. The eBird/Clements checklist of birds of the world: v2017, with updates to August 2017. Downloaded from http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/download/
  2. Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive (retrieved July 2018)
  3. Pizzey and Knight

Recommended Citation

External Links

GSearch checked for 2020 platform.1

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