Striped Cuckoo

How to find it

Listen for the song from scrubby fields, tangled second growth and edge habitat. The bird is hard to spot when it is not singing, so let your ears lead. A local guide says the song is easy to imitate, and imitating it often makes the bird show itself. One tour group heard one, then found it along the Río Tárcoles just after a boat trip started. Another was seen through a scope along an entrance drive in the deep south.

How to recognise it

This is a medium-sized cuckoo, about 27 to 30 cm long across its range, with a long tail.

Look for these marks:

A short, shaggy, reddish-brown and black crest.

A pale eyebrow stripe and a dark malar stripe.

A brown back streaked with black.

Off-white underparts.

A conspicuous black alula, a small wing feather.

Long upper tail coverts, about half the length of the tail.

Young birds are spotted with buff and look more rufous on the back and wings.

What it sounds like

Recording: Dan MacNeal, CC BY 4.0, source, read 4 Nov 2026.

Behaviour and diet

The Striped Cuckoo is solitary and active by day. It eats large insects, mainly grasshoppers and caterpillars, often picked off the ground. It tends to stay in bush cover but will sing from more open perches. When alarmed or disturbed it flashes its alulae.

It is also a brood parasite, laying eggs in the domed nests of other birds. Hosts known in Costa Rica include spinetails, Thryothorus wrens and Arremon sparrows.

Where it lives

In Costa Rica it lives in open areas with scattered trees, pasture, secondary forest, savanna, scrub and farmland. A guide reports hearing it in humid places below about 1,400 m wherever there is enough edge habitat. One photo record comes from El Rodeo Forest Reserve, San José, at 966 m, where the bird was foraging in a field.

It is mainly a bird of the humid lowlands of the southern Pacific and the Caribbean, with smaller numbers in the Central Valley.

When to see it

The song is a common part of the soundscape during much of the year in Costa Rica. One tour report noted that birds were usually not too vocal at that time of year.

Similar birds

It is the only cuckoo in its range with a streaked back, which is how it got its name. Its short shaggy crest, pale eyebrow and dark malar stripe separate it from other Costa Rican cuckoos. The only other ground-dwelling cuckoo in the country is the very hard-to-find Pheasant Cuckoo.

Names and lore in Costa Rica

In Costa Rica the species is called Cuclillo Listado, and local names include Rondero, Tres Pesos, Guía león and Ave de las Ánimas. The name Cuclillo Listado is used in Costa Rica and Nicaragua, while other countries use different names, such as cuco rayado in Mexico and crespín in Argentina.

Status and conservation

The AOCR official list classes it as a resident (R) in Costa Rica, and the IUCN lists it as Least Concern.

Photography tips

Once you have heard one, scan hedgerows and river edges, since it will sing from more open perches. Imitating the whistle can coax it into the open, and a bird was photographed this way in the Sarapiquí lowlands. A scope helps for a bird sitting in cover.