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Cuckoos beg the answer

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  • Rory Howlett

    (Deputy Biological Sciences Editor of Nature)

Abstract

Pity the poor reed warbler parents that have a cuckoo egg laid in their nest. Not only does the cuckoo fledgling eject the reed warblers' young, but it then persuades its hosts to feed it at a rate equivalent to feeding an entire brood of its own nestlings. Some ingenious field and laboratory experiments have exposed the cues concerned. It turns out that the cuckoo chick's begging call, a continuous and rapid ‘si, si, si, si’ is quite unlike that of an individual reed warbler chick, but closely resembles that of an entire brood of them. Vocal trickery, then, seems to be the explanation for why the reed warbler parents are fooled into the accelerated provisioning rate.

Suggested Citation

  • Rory Howlett, 1998. "Cuckoos beg the answer," Nature, Nature, vol. 393(6682), pages 213-215, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:393:y:1998:i:6682:d:10.1038_30354
    DOI: 10.1038/30354
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