General

Yellow-billed Cuckoo: Medium-sized cuckoo with gray-brown upperparts and white underparts. Eye-rings are pale yellow. Bill is mostly yellow. Wings are gray-brown with rufous primaries. Tail is long and has white-spotted black edges. Sexes are similar.

Range and Habitat

Yellow-billed Cuckoo: Breeds from central California, Minnesota, and southern New Brunswick southward. Spends winters in South America. Preferred habitats include moist thickets, willows, overgrown pastures, and orchards.

Breeding and Nesting

Yellow-billed Cuckoo: One to five light blue green to yellow green eggs are laid in a flimsy saucer of twigs built in a bush or small sapling. Incubation ranges from 9 to 11 days and is carried out by both parents.

Foraging and Feeding

Yellow-billed Cuckoo: Mainly feeds on hairy caterpillars and cicadas; also eats other insects, bird eggs, snails, small vertebrates such as frogs and lizards, berries, and some fruits; forages in trees.

Readily Eats

Suet

Vocalization

Yellow-billed Cuckoo: Song is a rapid, harsh, rattling "ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-ka-kow-kow-kowp, kowp, kowp, kowp", slowing down at the end.

Similar Species

Yellow-billed Cuckoo: Black-billed Cuckoo has red eye-ring, black bill, smaller tail spots, and lacks cinnamon-brown primaries. Mangrove Cuckoo has black mask, buff breast, larger white tail spots, and lacks cinnamon-brown primaries.