Eudynamys scolopaceus
Silhouette: Nicolas Huet le Jeune and Jean-Gabriel Prêtre (vectorized by T. Michael Keesey) · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~80% in a week >90%
The Asian koel (Eudynamys scolopaceus) is a member of the cuckoo family of birds, the Cuculidae. It is found in the Indian subcontinent, China, and Southeast Asia. It forms a superspecies with the closely related black-billed koels, and Pacific koels which are sometimes treated as subspecies. The Asian koel, like many of its related cuckoo kin, is a brood parasite that lays its eggs in the nests of crows and other hosts, who raise its young. They are unusual among the cuckoos in being largely frugivorous as adults. The name koel is echoic in origin with several language variants. The bird is a widely used symbol in Indian, Pakistani and Nepali poetry.
In 1747, the English naturalist George Edwards included an illustration and a description of an Asian koel in the second volume of his A Natural History of Uncommon Birds book. He used the English name "The Brown and Spotted Indian Cuckow". Edwards based his hand-coloured etching on a specimen from Bengal that belonged to the London silk-pattern designer and naturalist Joseph Dandridge. When in 1758 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his Systema Naturae for the tenth edition, he placed the Asian koel with the... Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hajipur | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 2 | Vijayawada | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 3 | Yangon | 🇲🇲 Myanmar | |
| 4 | Tiruppur | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 5 | Visakhapatnam | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 6 | Madurai | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 7 | Puducherry | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 8 | Coimbatore | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 9 | Bangkok | 🇹🇭 Thailand | |
| 10 | Bhubaneshwar | 🇮🇳 India |
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jijamata Udyaan | 🇮🇳 India | |
| 2 | Chai Nat Bird Park | 🇹🇭 Thailand | |
| 3 | Penang Bird Park | 🇲🇾 Malaysia |
Likely
About 40% of wildlife watchers report an Asian Koel sighting in Udawalawe National Park on a given day, based on 207 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 46th most-seen of the 166 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 80%, and over a week to over 90%, if each day is a fresh chance.
May and October–November
In those months about 50% of wildlife watchers report an Asian Koel in Udawalawe National Park on a given day, against about 20% in September, the lowest month. Those are among Udawalawe National Park's wettest months, with about 270 mm of rain a month against 45 mm in June.
Between 7 and 10 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Asian Koel sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Among the best
Of the 32 parks where we can rate Asian Koel sightings, Udawalawe National Park ranks 2nd at about 40%, level with the leaders once rounded. The best odds are in Gir National Park (India, about 40%). All parks ranked.
Same family: Cuculidae
The closest relatives of the Asian Koel that you can see in Udawalawe National Park (family Cuculidae, Cuckoos) are Blue-faced Malkoha (about 50%), Greater Coucal (about 40%) and Jacobin Cuckoo (about 30%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Asian Koel is recorded against all the birds logged in Udawalawe National Park (207 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), 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.
