Cuckoo

High school (ages 12+)
Animals & Nature

Name:

Date:

Step 1 · Read the article

Open the article and read it at the level above. Then answer the questions below in your own words.

https://smallwhale.org/articles/cuckoo

Write what each word means, using the article.

Do not copy the article. Write two things you learned, the way you would explain them to a friend.

Answers below are taken from the article’s stored facts, so they match what the student read.

1. What is the scientific name?Cuculus canorus
2. What is the conservation status?Least Concern
3. What is a cuckoo and why does it lay its eggs in other birds' nests?A cuckoo is a bird that lays its eggs in the nests of other birds. The other bird then raises the cuckoo chick as if it were its own.
4. How does a cuckoo chick get all the food from the host parents?When the cuckoo chick hatches, it pushes other eggs or chicks out of the nest. This makes the host parents feed only the cuckoo chick.

Obligate Brood Parasitism: A reproductive strategy where a species is entirely dependent on other species for raising its young.
Egg Mimicry: The ability of a parasitic bird to lay eggs that closely resemble the eggs of its host species.
Evolutionary Arms Race: A struggle between competing sets of species that add to one another's adaptations, such as host defenses against brood parasites.
Infanticide: The killing of newly hatched young, often an instinctual behavior for survival in parasitic chicks.