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Give that bird a lozenge
We love living in the country, and we especially love springtime (did we mention that already?). We love the rituals of the changing seasons, and get unreasonably excited when we see our first swallows, and hear the first cuckoo.
But our joy is wearing a bit thin this year as we worry that there may not be that many cuckoos around to herald future springtimes. According to the BBC Wales website cuckoo numbers declined 37% between 1994 – 2007, and judging by the apparently solitary existence of our neighbourhood cuckoo, things really are getting tough out there in cuckoo land.
We heard our first cuckoo some weeks ago, and have been hearing him sporadically ever since. But this week things have been hotting up, presumably as the poor chap gets more and more desperate to find a mate. For the last several days our local bird has been calling pretty much continuously from dawn to dusk, enchanting us and visitors to the nursery, but apparently not charming any lady cuckoos.
You can have too much of a good thing of course, and while the cuckoo’s call is undoubtedly captivating, it can be, well, a bit intrusive when it starts at 4.30 am, and frankly, a bit monotonous after 5 or 6 hours.
It must be the same for the poor bird tho’ mustn’t it? Imagine having a total vocabulary of just two syllables, and having a charm offensive consisting of nothing more than continually repeating them. And then having to repeat them to the point that you get the ornithological equivalent of laryngitis – grim times indeed in cuckoo land.
Actually, we’re not sure whether our local bird is struggling, or just introducing a bit of contrived variety to relieve his own boredom. Or perhaps he’s going for the sympathy vote…..but every so often, he loses it, and his normally sonorous “cuckoo” comes out as a wheezy “cu, cu, a, hooo”. Or the second syllable comes in for a bit of improv croup, and we get “cuck, ah, ah, hoo”.
All we hope is that he finds a mate soon, and comes back next year….
June 6th, 2010 at 15:41
The Cuckoo comes in April
And sings his song in May
In the middle of June,
He changes Tune
And then he flies away.
Perhaps your cuckoo was just changing tune earlier than usually expected? I hope so. I’ve never heard of a cuckoo with a sore throat!!!!
June 6th, 2010 at 17:38
I don’t think so – I think he genuinely had a frog in his throat! We were thrilled last week to hear another cuckoo calling back to him, so hopefully he has found a friend….and then a couple of nights ago, his call did indeed change (which I didn’t realise they did!). So hopefully, everything’s well!