Once upon a time I occasionally saw a Fan-tailed Cuckoo or a Pallid Cuckoo during the cooler months. Then they stopped coming & I wondered if they preferred more open country than our revegetated block began to provide. Then a Pallid Cuckoo appeared one day a couple of years ago. Today I investigated a bunch of agitated New Holland Honeyeaters & found that the source of their agitation was a Fan-tailed Cuckoo. Perhaps the Cuckoos are on the way back. Perhaps there's an interesting relationship between these two Cuckoo species & the state or structure of the vegetation they prefer. Any thoughts?
Have only seen them in fairly open wooded area where they act much like a GST.
Fly from perch to perch keeping a sharp lookout unless they are chasing catepillars in the bark.
Thanks Rick. Now that I think about it the Fan-tailed Cuckoo I saw today was on the edge of our block as was the Pallid Cuckoo I saw a couple of years ago. Both faced relatively open country on the other side.
They do prefer open country but they're not completely restricted to it - I've seen Fan-tailed Cuckoos in fairly dense forest adjacent to hanging swamps
Thanks, Owl. That's encouraging. Hopefully, I'll see more of this species. But no sightings since the recent one.