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Message: <blockquote data-quote="chowchilla" data-source="post: 1547827" data-attributes="member: 61100">Hi BBB,First of all, I'd say that the Bronze Cuckoos can fool the experts at times and I'm certainly no expert!I've had another look and I can see where you're coming from re: the tail. I was thinking more 'Little' Bronze btw. I see this species all the time (even from my balcony) and it really is by far the commonest Bronze Cuckoo around Cairns. I see Horsfield's generally further afield. I suppose 'Cairns area' could mean further afield in this sense, but if this was actually Cairns City, 99% of the time it would be Gould's/Little.Some birds are textbook and others are really quite variable. This is one of the reasons Little and Gould's haven't (and won't be) split, because you get a lot of intergrades; and those tails can be confusing at times too! For some reason I just seemed to recall the tail reminding me of Little. To me I could see a clear red eye ring, but it may be a trick of the light. Also that 'mask' effect seems apparent in some Littles. Also I was IDing by memory and usually Gould's/Little is easy for me around Cairns not least because of the call. So yep, based on the tail it looks more likely to be Horsefield's! As I said, if this was away from Cairns, I'd be far less ready to make a snap ID. I guess I just thought Cairns and the obvious just came to mind. TBH, you've probably seen more Horsefield's than me, as I really haven't travelled much at all in Aus (certainly not as much as you). I'm hoping to go to WA in September and get a better look at some of these potential confusion species. Thanks for the heads up!:t:</blockquote>

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