In Kirkmichael the cuckoo seldom arrived before the beginning of May, and its coming was often announced by cold northerly blasts and showers of snow. The people took this spell of hard weather as a good omen of the summer ahead and called it the heavy storm of the cuckoo. The minister of Kirkmichael recorded the Gaelic name among the parish’s birds.
The heavy storm of the cuckoo
Printed under 1 May · Kirkmichael, Banffshire
Lore and belief
This temporary rigour of the weather is called by the people, glas-shiontachd na cuach, or the heavy storm of the cuckoo.
From Sinclair's Statistical Account of Scotland, vol. 12, p. 451. Read the original
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