Professor Nick Davies discusses Cuckoo behaviour

Professor Nick Davies FRS, with Dr Jenny York, have described how female cuckoos rely on deception as a distraction technique to allow it to trespass into another bird's nest and lay an egg.  By imitating the call of a sparrowhawk the cuckoo is able to distract the host bird from the cuckoo's own actions. The details are available from the Times (subscription required) or the Statesman, and Jenny York discussed the research on BBC Inside Science (starting at 19:55).

To hear more about Professor Davies research, you can listen to this episode of the BBC's 'The Life Scientific'.