#lesser ground-cuckoo

[keeskiwi]

Cuckootober Day 3 - Lesser ground-cuckoo (Morococcyx erythropygus)

An arid-loving cuckoo from the Pacific slopes of central America.

[tinylongwing]

trick or treat !! 🎃🎃

Get cuckooed!!!

This is a Lesser Ground-Cuckoo, a close relative of the roadrunners. That blue eye skin! I'm still not over it.

Banded with permits by trained researchers, photographed for documentation and released on site (in Nicaragua! very cool place to work)

[birdstudies]

January 21, 2021 - Lesser Ground-Cuckoo or Rufous-rumped Cuckoo (Morococcyx erythropygus)

Found in parts of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, and Nicaragua, these cuckoos live in forests and shrublands. Feeding on insects, especially grasshoppers, they forage on the ground and in the understory in pairs or small groups. They build shallow bowl-shaped nests from sticks and other materials on the ground. Females lay clutches of two eggs, which both parents incubate.

[tinylongwing]

🍁🍃Trick-or-Treat 🎃🍬

An all-time favorite of mine! This is the one and only Lesser Ground-Cuckoo we banded in Nicaragua while I was working there, this one in 2017. This is a miniature, colorful relative of the more familiar Greater Roadrunner (which, yes, is a species of ground cuckoo!)