Some moments turn out special, more so than the rest of any trip. This time round it was a pair of Diderick cuckoos that stole the limelight. On Monday morning… while we moved from one ringing site to the next along Wakkerstroom's Old Rail Road, I first spotted the female. They are such photogenic birds that I always try to get shots in spite of them being quite common this time of year. Mrs Diderick turned out to be very tolerant of the camera and suddenly I found myself up-close and personally involved in a wooing session.

Mr Diderick would catch a caterpillar and offer it to the begging female while he proudly cocks his tail and hangs his wings in the universal male courting pose.

This male hit upon a horde of caterpillars, sometimes arriving with another offering before the paramour had swallowed the previous present. Diderick cuckoos feed almost exclusively on caterpillars and termites. The pair thus forms a bond that extends to a play of distraction and deceit where the male cuckoo would have the potential host of his brood committed to chase him from their nesting site. While the potential foster parents are so occupied and their nest unattended, the female sneaks into the host’s nest and quickly deposits an egg. Diderick cuckoos mainly use bishops, weavers, sparrows and wagtails to play host to their chicks, actually removing any eggs present in the host's nest, sometimes even eating it some distance away. The female can lay up to 24 eggs during a breeding season, one egg per host's nest.

The cuckoos must be careful in their quest... if caught by the robust bishops and weavers, they risk serious injury. Having ringed numerous Cape, lesser masked and Southern masked weavers, I can attest to their ability to deliver a serious bite… certainly powerful enough to even kill a cuckoo. This misfortune befalling the Diderick has been witnessed previously.

The newly hatched Diderick cuckoo evicts any competition from the nest when it is 3 days old. It stays in the nest for about 19-22 days, and out of the nest, the chick remains with its adopted parents for about 21 more days. The juvenile Diederik looks much different from its parents, sporting a bright red beak and pale blue eyes. With age the bill will turn black and the eyes red (if it is a male bird) or brown (if it is a female bird).

About half of the cuckoo chicks survive to nest-leaving age, making it a very successful bird!

Casual observers would think that the feeding ritual is that of an adult feeding a chick… when in fact they have been privy to a courtship ritual. The adult birds never feed their own chick. After the chick hatches, it is the unenviable task of the host bird (commonly HALF the size of the chick) to raise the young Diderick to fledgling status… having one heck of a challenge to meet the ravenous appetite of the large nestling.  

The Diderick is a short-distance seasonal migrant, moving with the rains. It is a solitary bird, found in a large range of habitats in open woodland, savannah and riverside bushes.