Jabarkhet

Large Hawk Cuckoo

Hierococcyx sparverioides

A bird of the Himalayas and North-east India, this is the largest cuckoo to be found in Jabarkhet. It is a secretive forest bird however, and more likely to be heard than seen. The song is largely in two parts: most distinctive is a rather hysterical rising “pee-pee-ah, pee-pee-ah” which rises into a rather frantic crescendo.

Sometimes this is also characterised as “brain fe-ver, brain fe-ver”, although the “brain fever bird” is really the smaller Common Hawk Cuckoo of the lower  elevations. For me, the Large Hawk Cuckoo really has 3 syllables in the “pee-pee-ah”:

It also makes a rolling rising call also with the underlying “pee-pee-ah” theme but with an entirely different sound:

 And the two can follow in sequence – here are two birds calling back and forth to each other, perhaps two males in a territorial dispute: