Bird Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ birds — with size, habitat, diet, voice, behavior, and the field marks that tell them apart.
White-tailed Kite
A pale, elegant hawk with black shoulder patches that hunts by hovering gracefully over open fields on beating wings.
raptor
Le Conte's Thrasher
The palest of the thrashers, a shy, sandy-colored bird of the open Mojave and Sonoran Desert flats that prefers running to flying.
songbird
Short-tailed Hawk
A compact tropical buteo, found in Florida in both dark and light color forms, that hunts songbirds from high overhead.
raptor
White-eyed Vireo
A skulking thicket-dweller with a pale eye, yellow spectacles, and a sharp, variable song, more often heard than seen.
songbird
Field Sparrow
A small, pink-billed sparrow with a plain gray face and rusty cap, known for its sweet accelerating 'bouncing ball' song.
songbird
Canyon Towhee
A drab, grayish-brown desert towhee closely resembling the California Towhee but with a faint breast spot and rustier crown.
songbird
Merlin
A compact, fast-flying falcon that chases down small birds with relentless, low-level pursuit rather than a high stoop.
raptor
King Eider
A striking Arctic sea duck; breeding males have a colorful orange, blue-gray, and green head crowned with a large orange frontal shield.
waterfowl
Least Flycatcher
The smallest and most vocal of the eastern Empidonax flycatchers, easily located by its emphatic, repetitive 'che-BEK' call.
songbird
Bell's Vireo
A small, drab, hyperactive vireo of dense willow and mesquite thickets, known for its fast, chattering, question-and-answer song.
songbird
Montezuma Quail
A round, secretive quail of southwestern oak woodlands, with a bold black-and-white harlequin facial pattern on males.
gamebird
Common Merganser
A large, sleek fish-eating duck with a slender hooked, serrated bill; breeding males have a glossy dark green head and clean white body.
waterfowl
Harris's Hawk
A dark chocolate-brown desert hawk famous for hunting cooperatively in family groups, unlike almost any other raptor.
raptor
Yellow-headed Blackbird
A striking marsh blackbird with a brilliant yellow head and breast on males, forming dense breeding colonies over open water.
songbird
Swallow-tailed Kite
An unmistakable black-and-white raptor with a deeply forked tail that glides effortlessly over southern swamps.
raptor
Flammulated Owl
A tiny, dark-eyed, migratory owl of western pine forests whose deep, ventriloquial hoot belies its diminutive size.
owl
Swainson's Warbler
A plain, secretive brown warbler of dense southeastern thickets, more often heard than seen thanks to its loud, ringing song.
songbird
Bullock's Oriole
The common western oriole, with males showing brilliant orange plumage, a bold black eyeline, and a large white wing patch.
songbird
Sage Thrasher
The smallest thrasher and a sagebrush-obligate songster of the arid interior West, singing long warbling songs from atop shrubs.
songbird
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
A striking black-and-white songbird whose breeding male sports a brilliant triangular rose-red patch on the breast and a massive pale bill.
songbird
Lawrence's Goldfinch
A gray-and-yellow goldfinch with a black face, restricted to California and Baja California and famously unpredictable in its movements.
songbird
Wrentit
A drab, long-tailed skulker of Pacific coastal chaparral, far more often heard than seen, with a distinctive bouncing-ball song.
songbird
Botteri's Sparrow
A large, plain-faced grassland sparrow known for a distinctive accelerating song likened to a bouncing ball coming to a stop.
songbird
Snail Kite
A marsh-dwelling raptor with a slender, deeply hooked bill perfectly shaped for extracting apple snails from their shells.
raptor