Black-tailed Cuckoothrush
Black-tailed
Cuckoothrush, Cucuturdus
nigracaudus L 35-40 cm, WS 35-40 cm, Family: Cuculidae
IUCN Conservation
Status: Critically
Endangered (CR)
Description:
Medium-sized
to large bird with a sturdy bill, flat head, and long tail. Mostly reddish brown,
with creamy undersides with narrow barring. Tail large and glossy black. Head
is large with distinct striped eyebrow plumes, and exposed blue skin around the
eye. Wings short and rounded, legs short and stocky. Juveniles lack eyebrows
and are heavily barred over entire body, including tail which is brown.
Voice:
Calls
can be nasal and crow-like or soft hooting and cooing like owls or doves. They
also squeal and hiss when alarmed.
Range and Habitat:
Current
status of the species is unclear, but if wild populations persist they are
likely in extremely remote montane forests. Historic range included mountainous
forests of all three major mountain chains on Novasola, though the range may
have extended into lower elevation forests. The last confirmed sighting took
place in 2005 in the northern Tumanny mountains. Black-tailed Cuckoothrushes prefer
mid- to high-elevation forests, especially wet forests on windward slopes. A
smaller population in the Morning mountains is disconnected, and these birds
may be found in drier ecosystems.
Discussion:
Since
European colonization of the island, the majority of endemic bird species on
Novasola have experienced severe population declines, are threatened with
extinction, or have gone extinct already. The status of the Black-tailed
Cuckoothrush is up in the air, and experts continue to debate over the
continued existence of the species. Many experts believe the species to be
extinct, either totally or functionally, while others hold out hope that
isolated individuals or populations may persist undetected. Setting aside low population
numbers, Cuckoothrushes are incredibly difficult to observe to begin with, as
their solitary nature and preference for extremely remote mountain forests make
them quite elusive. Despite remaining “undiscovered” until 1903, the Black-tailed
Cuckoothrush began to decline as soon as white settlers started logging
operations in the early 19th century, but it experienced a dramatic
crash coinciding with the advent of industrial logging techniques in the 20th
century. Loss of habitat is credited with the major contributing factor for the
species’ decline, which was exacerbated by climate change. Heavy logging led to
habitat fragmentation and loss on such a scale that the cuckoothrush could not
recover, and by 1995 only a few small, isolated populations were known to
exist. The last known population of Black-tailed Cuckoothrushes was limited to
a small patch of undisturbed forest in the Tumanny mountains and estimated to number
around 50 individuals. However, this forest was almost entirely burned in a
massive wildfire in 2001 which was believed to have wiped out all remaining
birds, putting the proverbial nail in the coffin for the species. But in 2005 members
of the Forest Service heard a Black-tailed Cuckoothrush calling and managed to capture
an audio recording. Though the recording is of poor quality, it is unmistakably
a Black-tailed Cuckoothrush, which makes this the last confirmed encounter. The
exact location of this encounter is kept secret, but it happened somewhere in
the northern Tumanny mountains, not far from Zeleny Creek which, perhaps
coincidentally, was the last known location of a wild Pheasant-tailed
Cuckoothrush before that species went extinct.
Since
the 2005 sighting, many people have gone exploring, hoping to find more
evidence of Black-tailed Cuckoothrush persistence. In that time there have been
a number of purported encounters varying in credibility and reliability. None
so far have been so convincing to pass scientific rigor, but enough doubt has
been raised that the Black-tailed Cuckoothrush remains on the endangered
species list and has not been officially declared extinct. Researchers at Novasola
State University, in collaboration with the US Forest Service and Fish and
Wildlife Service, have established a long-term study searching for the bird.
They use a combination of video and audio recorders and researcher encounters,
in a huge, undisclosed area of forest in the northern Tumannys. This is similar
to projects in the American south looking for the presumed-extinct Ivory-billed
Woodpecker. As of 2023, this project has released no findings, though they claim
to have compelling evidence which is currently under peer review and will be
published soon.
While
many people are excited about the prospect of “re-discovering” a lost species, many
others have doubts or concerns. Some scientists argue it’s a waste of time and
resources to search for the Black-tailed Cuckoothrush because wildfires have certainly
finished off whatever tiny numbers remained in 1995. And, even if we were to
find new populations, they would surely be so small and inbred, with so little
habitat, that it would serve no purpose other than for us to get the opportunity
to re-observe their extinction, as it were. Some conservationists are quick to
point out that the Black-tailed Cuckoothrush has become a sort of cultural
myth, entering the category of cryptozoology like Sasquatch or the Lock Ness
Monster, and as a result more and more people are heading to areas of potential
critical habitat with the intention of finding the bird. The unintended
consequence of this increased traffic to fragile ecosystems, however, is a huge
increase in litter, pollution, noise, and other human disturbance in these
areas; the very areas we should be protecting at all costs. It’s possible, they
argue, that our search for the species will ultimately cause its true
extinction and everything would be better off if we left the Black-tailed
Cuckoothrush’s status as a mystery. The rebuttal to these arguments is that if new
populations of critically endangered cuckoothrushes were to be found, they
could be used to protect huge areas of forest otherwise open to logging and
thus could be a huge asset to conservation.
Because
the Black-tailed Cuckoothrush has been rare and declining for so long, little
is known about their ecology and life habits. They are forest specialists and
were rarely found outside mid- to high-elevation forests dominated by firs,
pines, hemlocks, and goldcedar, and preferred steep slopes. They avoid
disturbance like wildfire and human development, and its thought their
preference for rugged, remote terrain and subalpine forests protected them from
an even faster extinction because these areas were harder for loggers to clear
and access. As a result, there are still sections of unbroken subalpine forest
wherein they could persist. Non-migratory, Black-tailed Cuckoothrushes would
remain in their territories year-round. They form monogamous pairs and bond for
life. They build nests in the subcanopy, and also engaged in nest parasitism,
though the degree to which they parasitized nests is unknown. They had
incredibly short incubation times; the entire time from laying eggs to rearing
offspring until they fledge possibly lasted less than three weeks, and
cuckoothrushes could lay as many as four broods a breeding season, excluding
any eggs that were placed in other bird nests.
The
diet of Black-tailed Cuckoothrushes consisted of invertebrates, bird eggs, and
small vertebrates like rodents, amphibians, and snakes.
Black-tailed
Cuckoothrush are members of the genus Cucuturdus which was only found on
Novasola and are related to other cuckoos in the family Cuculidae. Their
placement in the family is clear, but where in the family they belong, in other
words to which other species they are most closely related, is unknown. They
were named Cuckoothrushes because of their superficial similarity to thrushes, not
only in their coloration but also their eggs, which look incredibly like thrush
eggs. One theory posits cuckoothrushes were first observed laying eggs in
thrush nests.
The
Black-tailed Cuckoothrush was first described for science by Richard Reichwald
in 1903 after the second NRC expedition. By that time the species had already
begun to decline and was quite rare. This and their remote habitat meant that
Reichwald had very few encounters and observations of the bird upon which to
base his writings. Nonetheless, he was able to recognize the species’ peril,
and by his death in 1948 Reichwald had witnessed the meteoric crash in
Black-tailed Cuckoothrush numbers and predicted the species would be lost in
100 years. 57 years later, the species would be presumed extinct.
“As
our party continued north my ears were met by a strange calling. The owner of
this voice must surely be proud, as the volume of the calling was sufficient to
impress even Mr. Jackson, who by my estimation must surely be deaf in at least
one of his two ears. The sound was quite nasal and very much like that of a
Fish Crow or fledgling Raven. It called at even intervals of a few seconds from
somewhere to the east, possibly the ridgetop.” – Expedition log, July 8, 1903
“I
had this morning discovered an odd nest which was built on the top of a small,
stunted fir. The nest was a sad assortment of twigs and lichens which could be
mistaken for a loose pile of debris deposited by a stormwind were it not for
the three sky-blue eggs deposited within. I could only guess as to the
architect, until I heard from the next ridge a familiar calling I had heard below
the western Uludacks.
…
I
watched as a pair of birds flew in from the other ridge. They were large and a
warm clay-red color, but their most distinguished feature was an oily, slick
black tail which shined in the proper sunlight. When they perched by the nest I
was afforded a better view. They had striped breasts and curious facial plumes.
I could not differentiate their sexes, and curiously neither immediately began
incubating. Instead, they hopped about the nearby trees, occasionally cooing to
one another in a soft, dove-like manner, for perhaps two minutes and then flew
off in the same direction from which they arrived.” – Expedition log, July 13,
1904
“This
bird is no doubt in kinship with the Pheasant-tailed Cuckoo Thrush. Much in
their manner and appearance is shared between them, in as much as I can identify
with my limited experience with either species.” – Native Birds of Novasola, 1912
“In
my thirty years exploring the Fastwaters I have been fortunate to document so
many wonders of God’s Creation. I have had the displeasure also of documenting
Man’s treatment of Creation. Take for illustration the Black-tailed Cuckoo
Thrush, a marvel to behold, is but an autumn leaf under the bootheel of
industry. Where once I assumed the species to be rare and secretive, I now
understand it to be imperiled and dying. Like the Bison of the west the
Black-tailed Cuckoothrush is vanishing from our lands and should we decide not
to care, it will inevitably join its brother, the Pheasant Tail, in oblivion.” –
Richard Reichwald, “Another Eulogy for the Cuckoo Thrush”, Forest and
Stream magazine, 1932