Intern Adventures: Timing is Everything — Early Bird in the Field Spots Rare Cuckoo

After waking up at 4:00 a.m. to an unwelcomed alarm, I grabbed my coffee, jumped in my truck, and headed out for a day of fieldwork. A beautiful Idaho morning was dawning as I pulled into the dirt parking lot, to meet U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service biologists Katie Powell and Jaan Kolts. Surrounded by nothing but farmland and cattle, our objective for the day was straightforward — find the elusive, threatened, yellow-billed cuckoo. Simple? Yes. Easy? No. The yellow-billed cuckoo is a neotropical migrant, meaning it migrates to South America during the winter and breeds in North America during the summers. They are flashy birds with a bright white breast, long spotted tails, and a distinctive down-curved, yellow bill. Cuckoos in the West need healthy, riparian corridors full of mature cottonwoods. They rely on a complex understory of willows and shrubs that provide plenty of forage, especially caterpillars. <a href="https://medium.com/usfwspacificnw/intern-adventures-timing-is-everything-early-bird-in-the-field-spots-rare-cuckoo-3a1367afc845">Read More</a>