Guira cuckoo

The guira cuckoo (Guira guira) is a gregarious bird found widely in open and semi-open habitats of northeastern, eastern and southern Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia, and northeastern Argentina. It is the only species placed in the genus Guira.

Guira cuckoo
At the Pantanal, Brazil
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Clade: Dinosauria
Class: Aves
Order: Cuculiformes
Family: Cuculidae
Genus: Guira
Lesson, 1830
Species:
G. guira
Binomial name
Guira guira
(Gmelin, JF, 1788)

Taxonomy

The guira cuckoo was described and illustrated in 1648 by the German naturalist Georg Marcgrave in his Historia Naturalis Brasiliae. He used the name "Guira angatara".[2] The word Güirá means "bird" in the Guarani language.[3] Later ornithologists based their descriptions on Marcgrave's account: Francis Willughby in 1678,[4] John Ray in 1713,[5] Mathurin Jacques Brisson in 1760,[6] and Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon in 1779.[7] When the German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin revised and expanded Carl Linnaeus's Systema Naturae in 1788 he included the guira cuckoo. He placed it with all the other cuckoos in the genus Cuculus and coined the binomial name Cuculus guira.[8] The guira cuckoo is now the only species placed in the genus Guira that was introduced in 1830 by the French naturalist René Lesson.[9][10] The species in monotypic: no subspecies are recognised.[10] It is most closely related to the anis in the genus Crotophaga.[11]

Description

The guira cuckoo has a total length of approximately 34 cm (13 in) and weighs 140 g (4.9 oz).[12] The sexes are very similar in appearance, except that the female is slightly larger than the male. Juveniles appear quite similar to adults.

The species has dark brown upperparts streaked with white, and whitish-buff throat, breast, underparts and rump. The tail is relatively long and broad, dark brown in color with a white-tip, and the legs are dark gray. The eyes and beak are yellow to orange, with a thin ring of featherless yellow skin around the eye (this commonly fades in captivity). There is a prominent orange-rufous crest.

The bird's call is unmistakable for being long and shrill, something between a long whistle and a wailing. Like other members of the subfamily Crotophaginae, the guira cuckoo gives off a strong, pungent odour.[13]

Behaviour

The guira cuckoo is a bird of open habitats such as pastures and wetlands, and its range has expanded significantly due to deforestation. Within its distribution, it is commonly seen in suburban parks and gardens. Like the related squirrel cuckoo, the guira cuckoo is not a particularly adept flier, and usually flies only for short distances. It is often seen gliding or hopping from one perch to another while vocalizating loudly.

Although it is primarily an arboreal bird, it is often seen foraging on the ground, sometimes alone but often in flocks of up to 18 individuals. It is sometimes seen with other birds whose behaviour is similar, such as the smooth-billed ani. Unlike many of the Old World cuckoos, the guira cuckoo does not practice brood parasitism or kleptoparasitism.

Guira cuckoo with a captured frog. Tacuaras, Ñeembucú Department, Paraguay.

Food and feeding

The guira cuckoo is an opportunistic predator, gathering small prey items on the ground or searching for them among branches. It feeds on worms, insects and other arthropods, tadpoles and frogs, eggs, small birds (especially nestlings) and small mammals such as mice.[14] It also has been observed feeding on lizards.[15]

Breeding
Eggs, Collection Museum Wiesbaden

The nest is built on a tree fork 2 to 5 m (6.6 to 16.4 ft) from the ground. The eggs (from 5 to 7) are dark green and covered with a chalky layer. They are incubated either in individual or community nests; in the latter one can find up to 20 eggs. Under community nests there are many broken eggs. The competition between young being great, mortality is significant.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Guira guira.


References
  1. BirdLife International (2016). "Guira guira". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2016: e.T22684441A93030022. doi:10.2305/IUCN.UK.2016-3.RLTS.T22684441A93030022.en. Retrieved 11 November 2021.
  2. Marcgrave, Georg (1648). Historia Naturalis Brasiliae: Liber Quintus: Qui agit de Avibus (in Latin). Lugdun and Batavorum (London and Leiden): Franciscum Hackium and Elzevirium. p. 216.
  3. Jobling, James A. (2010). The Helm Dictionary of Scientific Bird Names. London: Christopher Helm. p. 181. ISBN 978-1-4081-2501-4.
  4. Willughby, Francis (1678). Ray, John (ed.). The Ornithology of Francis Willughby of Middleton in the County of Warwick. London: John Martyn. p. 140 No. 9, Plate 22.
  5. Ray, John (1713). Synopsis methodica avium & piscium (in Latin). London: William Innys. p. 45.
  6. Brisson, Mathurin Jacques (1760). Ornithologie, ou, Méthode Contenant la Division des Oiseaux en Ordres, Sections, Genres, Especes & leurs Variétés (in French and Latin). Vol. 4. Paris: Jean-Baptiste Bauche. p. 144, No. 19.
  7. Buffon, Georges-Louis Leclerc de (1779). "Le Guira Cantara". Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux (in French). Vol. 6. Paris: De l'Imprimerie Royale. pp. 407–408.
  8. Gmelin, Johann Friedrich (1788). Systema naturae per regna tria naturae : secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis (in Latin). Vol. 1, Part 1 (13th ed.). Lipsiae [Leipzig]: Georg. Emanuel. Beer. p. 414.
  9. Lesson, René (1830). Traité d'Ornithologie, ou Tableau Méthodique (in French). Paris: F.G. Levrault. p. 149, livraison 2. Published in 8 livraisons between 1830 and 1831. For the publication date see: Dickinson, E.C.; Overstreet, L.K.; Dowsett, R.J.; Bruce, M.D. (2011). Priority! The Dating of Scientific Names in Ornithology: a Directory to the literature and its reviewers. Northampton, UK: Aves Press. p. 119. ISBN 978-0-9568611-1-5.
  10. Gill, Frank; Donsker, David; Rasmussen, Pamela, eds. (January 2022). "Turacos, bustards, cuckoos, mesites, sandgrouse". IOC World Bird List Version 12.1. International Ornithologists' Union. Retrieved 7 August 2022.
  11. Sorenson, M.D.; Payne, R.B. (2005). "A molecular genetic analysis of cuckoo phylogeny". In Payne, R.B. (ed.). The Cuckoos. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 68–94. ISBN 0-19-850213-3..
  12. Payne, R.B. (1997). "Guira cuckoo". In del Hoyo, J.; Elliott, A.; Sargatal, J. (eds.). Handbook of the Birds of the World. Vol. 4: Sandgrouse to Cuckoos. Barcelona, Spain: Lynx Edicions. p. 603. ISBN 978-84-87334-22-1.
  13. Payne, Robert B. (2005). The Cuckoos. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 5. ISBN 978-0-19-850213-5.
  14. José Felipe Monteiro Pereira (2008). Aves e Pássaros Comuns do Rio de Janeiro. Rio de Janeiro: Technical Books. ISBN 978-85-61368-00-5. p. 71.
  15. Bernarde, Paulo Sérgio; Mota da Silva, Ageane; Recoder, Renato (2016). "Predation on the lizard Pantodactylus parkeri Ruibal, 1952 (Squamata: Gymnophthalmodae) by Guira guira (Aves, Cuculidae) in the Pantanal at Pocone, Western Brazil". Herpetology Notes 9: 279-281.


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