Cuculus Saturatus Research Articles

Estimation of reaction time for birdsongs and effects of background noise and listener’s age

Recordings of birdsong are often used as an auditory signal for visually-challenged people in public spaces in Japan. To examine the detectability of these sounds, we measured reaction times (RTs) for six types of birdsong: Jay, Cuckoo, Himalayan cuckoo, Japanese grosbeak, Japanese white-eye, and Japanese bush warbler. We presented birdsong stimuli with irregular timing to 20 younger and 20 older participants in combination with silence, white noise, or bandpass noise with a center frequency of 1, 2, or 4 kHz. Regardless of the output levels and participant age, the RT for the Jay, Cuckoo, and Himalayan cuckoo songs was lower than 0.75 sec in the silent condition, and the averaged RT obtained by the younger participants could be estimated on the basis of the duration required to reach a specified sound exposure level for the birdsong stimuli. In the noisy conditions, spectral masking via bandpass noise prolonged the RT, while the bandpass noise with a center frequency higher than that of the birdsong tended to shorten the RT, especially in older participants.

Diurnal and Seasonal Patterns of Calling Activity of Seven Cuculidae Species in a Forest of Eastern China

There is very little information on the diurnal and seasonal patterns of Cuculidae species’ calling activity in subtropical areas. In this study, we used passive acoustic monitoring to investigate the diurnal and seasonal patterns of calling activity of seven Cuculidae species at three sites in eastern China’s forest over a year. Our results showed that these species exhibited significant diurnal variations except for Cuculus micropterus. Eudynamys scolopaceus and Cuculus saturatus increased their vocal activity at dawn and dusk, whereas the other four species peaked their calling activity in the morning. Five species showed significant seasonal variations with a peak in vocal activities earlier in the season (late May or early June) and a gradual decline after that, except for Clamator coromandus, which displayed two peaks in seasonal calling activity. As for Cuculus micropterus, its calling activity was not significantly related to the season. Our study has provided basic knowledge about the calling patterns of seven Cuculidae species, and based on seasonal changes in vocal activity we propose that the breeding season of these species in east China begins in late May and ends in July.

Identification of Aves, Herpetofauna and Arthropods in Miangas Island (Indonesia), the borderline of Wallacea ecoregion

Suryawan A, Yuliantoro I, Mayasari A, Christita M. 2016. Identification of Aves, Herpetofauna and Arthropods in Miangas Island (Indonesia), the borderline of Wallacea ecoregion. Biodiversitas 18: 1528-1537. Miangas Island is located on the northeast of Wallacea and bordered by the Philippines and it belongs to Talaud archipelago. This study aims to identify the species of terrestrial wildlife in Miangas Island. Observations used the direct encounter method starting at 7:00 to 17:00 pm and they were conducted through four times visits in October and December 2015, April and May 2016. Some species were found, such as 15 species of birds, 3 species of lizards, 1 snake and 1 species of Arthropods. Hirundapus caudacutus and Butastur indicus are migrant bird species. Lamprolepis smaragdina is green and classified as tree climber type. It is included to hybrid lizard type of the Pacific and the Philippines. Based on IUCN database, Eos histrio is classified as endangered group (E), Ducula pickeringii as vulnerable (V) Todirhamphus enigma enigma is classified as near threatened group (NT), Birgus latro is classified as Data deficient (DD), while Butastur indicus, Lanius Schach, Nectarinia jugular plateni, Todirhamphus chloris, Hirundo tahitica, Hirundapus caudacutus, Egretta sacra, Ardea alba, Anthus cervinus, Motacilla cinerea, Cuculus saturatus, Passer Montanus, Ducula pickeringii, Eutropis multicarinata multicarinata, Lamprolepis smaragdina, Emoia caeruleocauda and Laticauda laticauda are classified as low risk (LC).

Cuckoos vs. top predators as prime bioindicators of biodiversity in disturbed environments

We studied the abundance of the common cuckoo Cuculus canorus L. little cuckoo Cuculus poliocephalus L. and Asian cuckoo Cuculus saturatus L. and avian top predators as indicators of bird species richness (surrogate of biodiversity) in disturbed environments caused by radioactive contamination in Chernobyl, Ukraine and Fukushima, Japan, comparing their efficiency as indicators of local biodiversity hotspots.Bird species richness and birds abundance were quantified in each sample site during the breeding seasons between 2006 and 2015 and the level of background radiation was measured at every site. The correlation between number of cuckoos, top predators, land use composition and level of background radiation with bird species richness as response variable were examined using Generalized Linear Mixed Models. The strength of correlation between species richness and abundance and the covariates obtained from the model outputs were used as measure of the efficiency of each predictor, as well as the AIC of each model. Background radiation was negatively correlated with bird species richness and bird abundance in both countries, while number of top predators and cuckoos were both positively correlated with bird species richness and abundance. However, model with number of cuckoos was more performant than model with number of avian top predators. These differences in performance supports the hypothesis that cuckoos are a largely superior bioindicator than top predators.

Song Characteristics of Oriental Cuckoo Cuculus optatus and Himalayan Cuckoo Cuculus saturatus and Implications for Distribution and Taxonomy.

Canwei Xia, Wei Liang, Geoff J. Carey, and Yanyun Zhang (2016) Song features during the breeding season are important in identifying species of cuckoos. Whether Oriental Cuckoo Cuculus optatus and Himalayan Cuckoo C. saturatus inhabiting the Palearctic and Oriental realms respectively can be distinguished according to song characteristics is uncertain. In this study, we performed a thorough investigation of the song characteristics of these taxa by collecting and analyzing recordings of song in their distribution areas. We found that songs could be divided into two groups based on the number of notes per syllable, and significant differences in other frequency and temporal features were also found between these two groups. The group with a song comprising two notes per syllable was shown to breed in Russia, Japan and China including Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, Heilongjiang and Taiwan, while the group with a song containing more than two notes per syllable was found to breed in the Himalayas and central China, extending northeast through north China as far as northeast Hebei, and south to southwest China. The distribution of these two groups was broadly related to the published distribution of populations of optatus and saturatus, respectively. Our data supported the separation of optatus and saturatus based on their song features, and also suggested refinements to the distribution of these two taxa, as follows: birds in north mainland China are saturatus, and those in Taiwan Island are optatus.

An Eastern Crowned Leaf WarblerPhylloscopus coronatusNest parasitized by an Oriental CuckooCuculus saturatuswith a Reddish Egg in Hokkaido, Japan

Abstract The distributions of the Little Cuculus poliocephalus and Oriental C. saturatus cuckoos differ throughout Japan. In Honshu, the Little Cuckoo parasitizes mainly the Japanese Bush Warbler Cettia diphone and lays reddish mimetic eggs. The Oriental Cuckoo mainly parasitizes the Eastern Crowned Leaf Warbler Phylloscopus coronatus and lays whitish eggs. However, in central Hokkaido, where no Little Cuckoos breed, Oriental Cuckoos parasitize Japanese Bush Warblers as their main hosts, in whose nests they lay reddish eggs. Anecdotal evidence suggests that they also parasitize Eastern Crowned Leaf Warblers, laying reddish eggs, but this has not been confirmed. Here, we report the first complete evidence in which an Oriental Cuckoo chick, which hatched from a non-mimetic reddish egg, was raised by Eastern Crowned Leaf Warbler hosts in Hokkaido.

Diversity of parasitic cuckoos and their hosts in China

Abstract In this expose we provide the first review of host use by brood parasitic cuckoos in a multiple-cuckoo system in China, based on our own long-term field data and a compilation of observations obtained from the literature. In total, we found that 11 species of cuckoos utilized altogether 55 host species. These hosts belong to 15 families, in which Sylviidae, Turdidae and Timaliidae account for 22.6%, 20.8% and 17.0% of parasitism records, respectively. The Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) had the widest range of host species, accounting for 45.5% of the total number of parasitized species (25 in 10 families) of all parasitism records and is the most frequent brood parasite in the country. Cuckoo species differed in their egg coloration and the extent of egg polymorphism with most of them, e.g. the Common Cuckoo, the Lesser Cuckoo (C. poliocephalus) and the Plaintive Cuckoo (Cacomantis merulinus) laying well mimetic eggs with respect to their hosts based on human being’s visual observations, while others such as the Large Hawk-cuckoo (C. sparverioides), the Himalayan Cuckoo (C. saturatus) and the Asian Emerald Cuckoo (Chrysococcyx maculatus) usually laid non-mimetic eggs. The use of cuckoo hosts and egg color variation in China are compared with those in other parts of their ranges in Asia.

Visual modeling reveals cryptic aspect in egg mimicry of Himalayan Cuckoo (Cuculus saturatus) on its host Blyth's Leaf Warbler (Phylloscopus reguloides).

Brood parasitism and egg mimicry of Himalayan Cuckoo (Cuculus saturatus) on its host Blyth's Leaf Warbler (Phylloscopus reguloides) were studied in south-western China from April to July 2009. The cuckoo laid a white egg with fine brown markings on the blunt end. The eggs were conspicuously bigger than the host's own, with 2.06 g in mass and 1.91 cm(3) in volume. Visual modeling showed that the cuckoo eggs, which from the human eye appeared to mimic the host eggs to a great extent, were completely different from the host eggs in both hue and chroma. The characters of the Himalayan Cuckoo nestling, reported for the first time, included two triangular and black patches on its gape, which appeared from four days old and became darker with age and growth. While this character also exists in nestlings of Oriental Cuckoo (C. optatus), it has not been found for other Cuculus species. Our results reveal cryptic aspects in the cuckoo-host egg color matching, which are not visible to the naked human eye, and indicate that high mimetic cuckoo eggs rejected by hosts, as determined by human observers in previous studies, might not be mimetic as birds see them.

ツツドリによるヤブサメヒナの遺棄行動

ツツドリによるヤブサメヒナの遺棄行動

２００５年の東大秩父演習林におけるウグイスおよびその他の鳥類の生息状況について

In 2005, we surveyed the birds inhabiting the Tokyo University Forest in Chichibu, in western Saitama Prefecture, Japan. Special attention was given to the Bush Warbler Cettia diphone, which appeared at the study site after 22nd March. We captured seven male Bush Warblers and banded them with individually unique combinations of color rings. Six males of them maintained the same home ranges (territory) throughout the study period, and no other males were observed. The population density of the males was 19.2 individuals per km2. Although we were unable to locate an active nest to study the breeding and rearing process, juveniles were captured in August. The tarsus length of juveniles reached the size of adults earlier than the natural wing length. Thus, in the juveniles, sexual size dimorphism was evident in the tarsus length to the same extent as seen in adults. We found nests of the Japanese White-eye Zosterops japonicus, Long-tailed Tit Aegithalos caudatus, Short-tailed Bush Warbler Urosphena squameiceps, Blue-and-white Flycatcher Cyanoptila cyanomelana and Red-billed Leiothrix Leiothrix lutea. The clutch of the Short-tailed Bush Warbler was believed to have been parasitized by the Oriental Cuckoo Cuculus saturatus. We confirmed that 40 species of birds occurred in the study area during the study period.

Effects of Habitat Fragmentation on Birds in Deciduous Forests in Japan

Abstract: Although migratory forest birds have declined at many sites in Japan, the negative effect of forest fragmentation on bird populations has not been intensively studied. We sought to ( 1 ) determine whether there are particular bird species or groups of species that are sensitive to the area and isolation of forests in Japan and ( 2 ) compare the types of species that are area‐sensitive in Japan, Western Europe, and eastern North America. We estimated the abundance of breeding birds by using the fixed‐radius, point‐count method in 53 deciduous forests ( 1–5045 ha ) in southern Hokkaido. Forest area was positively related to the abundance ( average number of individuals per survey plot ) and species richness ( average number of species per survey plot ) of forest‐interior birds and was negatively related to the abundance and species richness of forest‐edge birds. As in eastern North America, forest area was the best predictor of the abundance of several species of forest birds. Also, some species were restricted to large forests, with minimum areas larger than expected by chance. Forest area was not significantly related to the total abundance of tropical migrants, but five of the nine potentially area‐sensitive species were tropical migrants. Jungle Crows ( Corvus macrorhynchos ), which are nest predators, were more abundant in small forests than in large forests, but Oriental Cuckoos ( Cuculus saturatus ), which were the most common brood parasites, were more abundant in large forests. To conserve area‐sensitive species in deciduous forests in northern Japan, it will be necessary to preserve large areas of contiguous forest and monitor the effect of predators on nest success.

Differences in Bird Communities on the Forest Edge and in the Forest Interior. Are There Forest-interior Specialists in Japan?

Most North American bird species that are less successful in small forests than in large forests, are forest-interior specialists that winter in the tropics. These species have declined in small forests because of high rates of nest predation and brood parasitism near the forest edge. To determine whether migratory forest-interior specialists are also important components of bird communities in Japan, we surveyed bird populations on plots at the edge and in the interior of deciduous forests in Hokkaido and Kyoto. Surveys were conducted during the breeding season in forest fragments using the point count method. We calculated edge indices for the most abundant species in Hokkaido and Kyoto (38 and 18 species, respectively). Among the nine species that were more abundant in interior than in edge plots in Hokkaido were the following tropical migrants: Turdus cardis, Phylloscopus coronatus, and Cuculus saturatus. In Kyoto, the abundance of particular species of tropical migrants was too low to permit statistical analysis. We therefore analyzed the rare species as a group and this group was more abundant in the forest interior than on the forest edge. Three resident species, Garrulus glandrius, Picus awokera, and Bambusicola thoracica, were also more abundant in the forest interior. The most frequent potential nest predator, Corvus macrorhynchos, was more abundant at the edge than in the interior in Hokkaido, but showed the reverse pattern in Kyoto. The abundance of the most frequent brood parasite in Hokkaido, Cuculus saturatus, had a weak positive relation with the abundance of its host species, but was not significantly related to the distance from the forest edge. Therefore, the major negative edge effects in Japan may be due to nest predation by corvids. The impact of negative edge effects, as well as the effect of forest structure, on forest-interior birds in Japan should be the focus of future research.

An example of character release in host selection and egg colour of cuckoos Cuculus spp. in Japan

We have studied in northern Japan the hitherto unidentified eggs of a species of cuckoo in the nests of the Bush Warbler Cettia diphone. The cuckoo in question appeared to be the Himalayan Cuckoo Cuculus saturatus which parasitizes mainly the Willow Warbler Phylloscopus occipitalis in southern Japan. The egg colour in this northern Cuckoo was chocolate‐brown or orange‐brown, similar to that of the Bush Warbler but unlike that of the southern Himalayan Cuckoo. Egg size was significantly larger than that of the southern Himalayan Cuckoo and instead similar to that of the Little Cuckoo C. poliocephalus which uses the same host species in southern Japan, to which the Little Cuckoo is confined. The shift in host species and egg colour in the northern Himalayan Cuckoo seems to be a case of character release in the absence of the Little Cuckoo.

The Oriental Cuckoo (Cuculus saturatus) in Coastal New South Wales

The Oriental Cuckoo (<i>Cuculus saturatus</i>) in Coastal New South Wales