Coppery-tailed Coucal
Centropus cupreicaudus
Reedbeds. Rufous wings, darker on nape; cap and tail coppery-black.
Coucals
LC
Not Endemic
Description
Common resident. Larger than [Senegal Coucal] and [Burchell’s Coucal] with heavier bill, darker mantle, purple-black cap and longer tail with a coppery sheen. Upper tail coverts indistinctly barred buff. Immature has the tips of wing feathers barred dark brown, tail-feathers barred tawny. With experience can be told from other coucals by its deeper, richer call. Occurs in reed and papyrus beds, and riparian thickets in the Okavango Delta and Chobe River (northern Botswana) and the western Zambezi River (Zimbabwe).
Quick Facts
Size
44-50 cm - L
Names
A: Grootvleiloerie
Ss: Lefututu Le Leholo
G: Angola-Mönchskuckuck
Bird Family
Medium-sized birds which are notoriously secretive, usually keeping to dense vegetation making them difficult to see. Often the first give-away of their presence is their call. They eat insects, small reptiles, amphibians and sometimes the eggs and chicks of other birds. Coucals breed in early summer, building their cup-shaped nests fairly low and well hidden in thick vegetation; some species' nests are completely covered over.
Distribution
Gallery
Behaviour
Breeding
Habitat
Occurs in reed and papyrus beds, and riparian thickets in the Okavango Delta and Chobe River (northern Botswana) and the western Zambezi River (Zimbabwe).
