Surniculus lugubris
Silhouette: Nicolas Huet le Jeune and Jean-Gabriel Prêtre (vectorized by T. Michael Keesey) · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~10% in a week ~20%
The square-tailed drongo-cuckoo (Surniculus lugubris) is a species of cuckoo that resembles a black drongo. It is found along the Himalayas extending east into Southeast Asia. The calls are series of piercing sharp whistles rising in pitch but shrill and choppily delivered. In the past, the species S. lugubris also included the subspecies dicruroides, which is now treated as a separate species, the fork-tailed drongo-cuckoo.
The square-tailed drongo-cuckoo can be easily distinguished by its downcurved beak and the white barred vent and outer undertail, and the tail only notched with slightly flared tips. In flight, a white wing-stripe is visible from below. It is a brood parasite on small babblers. It is not known how or whether the drongo-like appearance benefits this species but it is suspected that it aids in brood-parasitism just as hawk-cuckoos appear like hawks.
The square-tailed drongo-cuckoo was formerly considered conspecific with the fork-tailed drongo-cuckoo (together known as the Asian drongo-cuckoo), but vocal and morphological differences suggested that the species should be split. Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bandar Lampung | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | |
| 2 | Kuala Lumpur | 🇲🇾 Malaysia | |
| 3 | Singapore | 🇸🇬 Singapore | |
| 4 | Jakarta | 🇮🇩 Indonesia | |
| 5 | Dehradun | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 6 | Kochi | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 7 | Kolkata | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 8 | Kozhikode | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 9 | Guangzhou | 🇨🇳 China | |
| 10 | Lucknow | 🇮🇳 India |
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Night Safari | 🇸🇬 Singapore | |
| 2 | Singapore Zoo | 🇸🇬 Singapore | |
| 3 | River Wonders | 🇸🇬 Singapore |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report an Asian Drongo-Cuckoo sighting in Jakarta on a given day, based on 40 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 77th most-seen of the 138 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, and over a week to about 20%, if each day is a fresh chance.
May and November–March
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report an Asian Drongo-Cuckoo in Jakarta on a given day, against under 5% in April and June–October, the lowest months.
Between 2 and 5 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Asian Drongo-Cuckoo sightings with a recorded time, and about 7 in 10 of them come between 6 pm and 6 am: it is most active around dawn and dusk.
4th of 17
Of the 17 cities where we can rate Asian Drongo-Cuckoo sightings, Jakarta ranks 4th at under 5%. The best odds are in Bandar Lampung (Indonesia, about 30%), Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia, about 10%) and Singapore (Singapore, under 5%).
Same family: Cuculidae
The closest relatives of the Asian Drongo-Cuckoo that you can see in Jakarta (family Cuculidae, Cuckoos) are Plaintive Cuckoo (about 20%), Cuculus nisicolor (about 10%) and Lesser Coucal (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Asian Drongo-Cuckoo is recorded against all the birds logged in Jakarta (40 verified sightings), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
