NOT A CLOCK IN SIGHT

Every spring it's always a great pleasure to have the call of the Cuckoo's about the farm. With so many nesting birds you think they'd be spoilt for choice for nests to lay their eggs in, but it seems that the one's up here specialise in Meadow and Tree pipits every time I spot a Cuckoo it's nearly always being mobbed by pipits. 
Their tactics are that the male draws the adult Pipits away whilst the female finds suitable nest site's to lay her solitary egg.

cuckoo being mobbed by meadow pipit

They arrive in late April and start making their way back to their wintering grounds in Africa in early July. Their offspring soon follow the adult birds so their stay here is very brief.
Steve has found Cuckoo eggs and chicks in pipit nests over the last couple of years and I've been lucky enough that he has shared his findings with me.

young cuckoo

We're into June now so it won't be long they start making their way back.

Still enough time hopefully for us to discover a cuckoo chick or two in the many Pipit nests that Steve finds each year.