APRIL signals the arrival of the cuckoo back in the district, and Fermanagh and Omagh District Council is calling on residents to listen out this spring for the well-known cuckoo’s call.
Cuckoo numbers across the UK and Ireland have halved in the past 20 years, so it’s more important than ever to report cuckoo calls to help build a clearer picture of cuckoo migration patterns and its preferred habitats.
The cuckoo is known as a ‘brood parasite’, as it cunningly never raises its own offspring.
Instead, it swoops in and lays eggs in other birds’ nests. The cuckoo chicks hatch first and roll the other eggs out of the nest one by one, tricking their new ‘foster parents’ into caring for them.
This tactic allows a female cuckoo to lay up to 22 eggs in one season without having to care for them all.
Cuckoos spend nine months of the year in Africa before migrating to these shores each spring.
The cuckoo can be tracked on its 4,000-mile trip north by following the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) project at the BTO website.
Cuckoo calls specifically can be reported to www.habitas.org.uk/records/submit-cuckoo-record.
However, the Council is also encouraging residents to report not only sightings of cuckoos, but any other species of interest they may also see, such as red squirrels, moorland birds, bumblebees or butterflies, at www.habitas.org.uk/records/home.