Bird Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ birds — with size, habitat, diet, voice, behavior, and the field marks that tell them apart.
Common Murre
A slender, penguin-like auk with a dark brown-black back and white underparts, breeding in dense, noisy cliff colonies.
seabird
Black-browed Albatross
The most abundant and widespread albatross species, easily identified by the bold dark stripe through its eye and its yellow-orange bill.
seabird
Black-legged Kittiwake
A true oceanic gull that spends most of its life far from land, breeding in dense, noisy colonies on sheer sea cliffs and named for its distinctive 'kitti-waaake' call.
seabird
Cory's Shearwater
A large, gull-like shearwater of the Atlantic Ocean, with brownish-grey upperparts, a yellowish bill, and a slow, languid flight low over the waves.
seabird
Common Loon
An iconic North American lake bird famed for its striking black-and-white checkered plumage and haunting, wavering calls.
seabird
Cassin's Auklet
A small, plain sooty-gray auklet of the North Pacific that nests in burrows and forages mainly on krill and other tiny crustaceans.
seabird
Brandt's Cormorant
A stocky, dark cormorant of the Pacific coast known for a buffy throat patch bordered by a striking blue breeding pouch, nesting in dense colonies on coastal cliffs and islands.
seabird
Cape Cormorant
A glossy black cormorant of the southern African coastline that forms some of the largest seabird breeding colonies in the world.
seabird
Cape Petrel
A striking black-and-white checkered petrel of the Southern Ocean, often called the Pintado Petrel, well known for following ships far from land.
seabird
Arctic Loon
The Eurasian counterpart of the Pacific Loon, with a pale grey head, black throat, and a bold white flank patch visible while swimming.
seabird
California Gull
A medium-large western gull celebrated in Utah folklore for eating a devastating cricket infestation that threatened early Mormon settlers' crops.
seabird
Chinstrap Penguin
A small, feisty Antarctic penguin named for the thin black line running under its chin, giving it a helmet-strap appearance.
seabird
Caspian Tern
The largest tern in the world, a gull-sized bird with a massive coral-red bill and a harsh, crow-like call, found on coasts and large lakes across every continent except Antarctica.
seabird
Australasian Gannet
A large white seabird with black wingtips and black central tail feathers that nests in dense colonies around Australia and New Zealand.
seabird
Black Tern
A small, buoyant marsh tern that turns almost entirely sooty black in breeding plumage and feeds by dipping to the water surface rather than plunge-diving.
seabird
Black Guillemot
A small all-black auk with striking white wing patches and bright red legs and mouth lining, found along rocky North Atlantic coasts.
seabird
Common Tern
A widespread, medium-sized tern found across North America, Europe, and Asia, with a black cap, red-orange bill, and deeply forked tail typical of the group.
seabird
Atlantic Puffin
A charismatic black-and-white seabird with a colorful triangular bill, nicknamed the 'sea parrot,' that nests in burrows on North Atlantic cliffs.
seabird
Adelie Penguin
A classic tuxedo-patterned penguin of Antarctica, easily told by the bold white ring encircling each eye.
seabird
Blue-footed Booby
An unmistakable brown-and-white booby famous for its bright blue feet, used in an elaborate courtship dance on Pacific coasts and islands.
seabird
American White Pelican
One of North America's largest birds, an enormous white waterbird with a huge orange bill and pouch that fishes cooperatively by herding fish into shallow water rather than diving.
seabird
Black Skimmer
A unique black-and-white coastal bird with an oversized red-and-black bill whose lower mandible is longer than the upper, used to skim fish from the water's surface in flight.
seabird
African Skimmer
A slender riverine skimmer of sub-Saharan Africa with an orange-yellow, black-tipped bill, sharing the family's unique lower-mandible-skimming feeding technique.
seabird
African Penguin
The only penguin species breeding on the African continent, named for its loud, donkey-like braying call and identified by a black facial mask and unique belly-spot pattern.
seabird