Short-winged Cuckoo

This is a medium sized cuckoo with both sexes alike. It has grey upperparts while the underside has broad black barring. The tail is barred with a broad subterminal dark band and a white tip. Young birds have white markings on the crown and white chin and throat contrasting with a dark face. Juveniles are browner and have broad white tips to the head and wing feathers. The eye-ring is gray to yellow . The iris is light brown to reddish. The female differs from the male in being slightly paler grey on the throat and in having more brown on the breast and tail. The barring on the belly is narrower than in the male. Nestlings have an orange-red mouth and yellow flanges to the gape.

The Short-winged Cuckoo is classified as Least Concern. Does not qualify for a more at risk category. Widespread and abundant taxa are included in this category.

the short-winged cuckoo (Cuculus micropterus) is also known as "better off single" (guang gun hao guo) and as "quick, quick, cut wheat" (kuai kuai ge mai), while the koel (Eu-dyn-a-mys scolopacea) is also called the "good song (ge hao) sparrow." Some members of a subfamily of the cuckoos, the Cuculinae, are always telling Chinese farmers to "Sow grain! Sow grain!" (bu gu). More