pheasant coucal
centropus phasianinus latin

Movement: A clumsy flyer, the pheasant coucal spends most its time on the ground.

Pheasant Coucal in breeding plumage, returning to breeding site of previous year.

The pheasant coucal's summer voice is a low descending 'boop boop boop'.

Pheasant Coucal This large, dark pheasant (to 68cm) has a long, broad, brown tail with light flecks and bands.

The male pheasant coucal does most of the incubating of eggs and feeding of young, as well as building the nest.

Predominantly carnivorous, the pheasant coucal eats small reptiles and amphibians, bird eggs and young, small mammals and large insects.

Pheasant Coucal - captive - NSW - died emaciated with a gizzard filled with concretions of ingesta.

Identification: Whilst breeding, the adult pheasant coucal has a black head and body, chestnut outer wings with black and brown barrings and straw coloured feather shafts.

The pheasant coucal is unusual among Australian cuckoos in that it incubates and raises its own young instead of laying its eggs in the nest of another species.

Some species (Centropus phasianinus) have the male investing more in incubation and parental care.

The pheasant coucal (Centropus phasianinus) is a species of cuckoo in the family Cuculidae.

Centropus phasianinus (Pheasant coucal)

Pheasant coucal Centropus phasianinus, greater coucal C. sinensis and Madagascar coucal C. toulou sometimes build an open nest while some species always build open nests (the bay coucal C. celebensis)

Timor pheasant coucal or Timor coucal, Centropus phasianinus mui - might be a full species Centropus mui (long known only by the holotype (a female) collected in 1974 but apparently rediscovered in the early 2000s)