As brimstones awake and buds blossom, a large grey bird appears. It perches on a fence post in the field, surveying its new quarters. From a distance, it could be a kestrel or a sparrowhawk, but the call gives him away: the open bill emits a ‘cuck’ – there’s a fleeting pause – and then the beak closes for the following ‘oo’. The onomatopoeically named bird has been a harbinger of spring in Britain for centuries – and I’ve loved hearing them ever since I moved to the countryside some decades ago. I dived into cuckoo culture for Country Life (2022).
