Bird Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ birds — with size, habitat, diet, voice, behavior, and the field marks that tell them apart.
Anna's Hummingbird
A common, non-migratory West Coast hummingbird whose males flash an iridescent rose-pink crown and throat and perform a spectacular, chirping high-speed dive display.
hummingbird
Gray Partridge
A round, orange-faced partridge of open farm country, introduced to North America from Europe, with a distinctive chestnut horseshoe mark on the male's belly.
gamebird
Red-headed Woodpecker
A striking, boldly patterned woodpecker with an entirely crimson head and a strongly contrasting black-and-white body, now declining across much of its range.
woodpecker
Pileated Woodpecker
North America's largest common woodpecker, a crow-sized, mostly black bird with a flaming red crest, famous for excavating large rectangular holes in dead trees.
woodpecker
Purple Martin
North America's largest swallow, a glossy blue-black aerial insectivore whose eastern population now nests almost entirely in birdhouses provided by people.
songbird
Dickcissel
A grassland songbird resembling a small meadowlark, with breeding males showing a yellow breast, black bib, and a name derived from its buzzy, insect-like song.
songbird
Pyrrhuloxia
A close desert relative of the Northern Cardinal, gray overall with red highlights and a stubby, parrot-like yellow bill, common in arid brushland of the Southwest.
songbird
Bicknell's Thrush
A rare, high-elevation thrush of northeastern mountaintop spruce forests, nearly identical to Gray-cheeked Thrush but with a much smaller, more threatened range.
songbird
Hepatic Tanager
A dusky, brick-red tanager of southwestern mountain pine-oak forests, named for a rich red color reminiscent of liver tissue, with a distinctive dark gray cheek patch.
songbird
McCown's Longspur
A thick-billed prairie longspur historically named for a 19th-century army officer; in 2020 the American Ornithological Society officially renamed the species Thick-billed Longspur.
songbird
Yellow-billed Cuckoo
Nicknamed the 'rain crow,' this secretive, elegant forest bird is renowned for its distinctive guttural calls and specialized appetite for hairy caterpillars.
other
Black Rosy-Finch
The darkest of the three rosy-finches, breeding only in a narrow band of high central Rocky Mountain peaks and considered especially vulnerable to a warming climate.
songbird
Yellow-throated Warbler
A gray-backed warbler with a bright yellow throat and bold black-and-white face pattern, well adapted for creeping along bark and probing pine needle clusters and Spanish moss.
songbird
Altamira Oriole
The largest oriole in the United States, a bright orange bird found only in the Rio Grande Valley of extreme south Texas, famous for weaving the longest hanging nest of any North American bird.
songbird
Prairie Warbler
A bright yellow, tail-wagging warbler of shrubby old fields and scrub, with bold black facial markings and chestnut streaking on the back despite its misleading name.
songbird
Greater Scaup
A robust diving duck of northern waters, best recognized by its rounded head, pale grey back, and preference for gathering in large, dense flocks on coastal bays and vast lakes.
waterfowl
California Condor
North America's largest flying land bird, an enormous black scavenger with a naked orange-pink head, brought back from the brink of extinction through intensive captive breeding.
raptor
Cerulean Warbler
A sky-blue, canopy-dwelling warbler of mature eastern forests, among the fastest-declining North American warblers due to habitat loss on both its breeding and wintering grounds.
songbird
Tennessee Warbler
A plain, energetic warbler with a gray head, white eyebrow stripe, and olive back, named for a stray specimen collected in Tennessee though it neither breeds nor regularly winters there.
songbird