Bird Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ birds — with size, habitat, diet, voice, behavior, and the field marks that tell them apart.
Ruddy Turnstone
A stocky, boldly patterned shorebird that flips stones, shells, and seaweed on the beach with its short, wedge-shaped bill in search of food.
shorebird
Fork-tailed Drongo
A glossy black, red-eyed African songbird known for its deeply forked tail, aerial hunting, and habit of mimicking alarm calls to steal food.
songbird
Juniper Titmouse
A plain gray, crested titmouse of pinyon-juniper woodlands across the Great Basin and interior West.
songbird
Sanderling
The pale, plump little sandpiper that chases retreating waves on sandy beaches worldwide, running like a wind-up toy to snatch food from the wet sand.
shorebird
Gray Jay
A fluffy, tame boreal-forest jay, officially renamed Canada Jay, known for its curiosity around campsites and its habit of hoarding food year-round.
songbird
Peruvian Pelican
A large, dark pelican of the cold Humboldt Current, closely tied to the rich anchoveta fisheries off Peru and Chile and vulnerable to periodic El Nino-driven food shortages.
seabird
Gray Vireo
A plain, uniformly gray, tail-flicking vireo of arid pinyon-juniper and chaparral country in the desert Southwest.
songbird
Woodhouse's Scrub-Jay
A pale, crestless blue jay of the interior West's pinyon-juniper woodlands, closely tied to pine nut crops.
songbird
Gray Flycatcher
A pale, long-tailed Empidonax flycatcher of sagebrush and pinyon-juniper country, distinguished by its habit of slowly dipping its tail downward.
songbird
Acadian Flycatcher
A greenish, large-billed Empidonax flycatcher of shaded eastern forest ravines, identified by its explosive 'peet-sah' song.
songbird
Willow Warbler
A delicate, greenish leaf warbler best known for its sweet, descending, cascading song, one of the clearest signs of spring across much of Europe.
songbird
Guianan Toucanet
A small toucan of the Guiana Shield forests, with males showing a black head and a mostly greenish bill, and females bearing a rich chestnut cap.
other
Lewis's Woodpecker
An unusually crow-like woodpecker with iridescent greenish-black plumage, a pink belly, and a habit of catching insects on the wing.
woodpecker
Bay-breasted Warbler
A boreal-forest warbler whose breeding males show rich chestnut on the crown, throat, and flanks, while fall birds turn plain greenish and are easily confused with Blackpoll Warbler.
songbird
Blue-crowned Motmot
A striking, sluggish forest bird with a black-bordered blue crown, greenish body, and a long, distinctive racket-tipped tail that it swings like a pendulum.
other
Willow Flycatcher
A plain, greenish-brown Empidonax flycatcher best identified by its sneezy 'fitz-bew' song, breeding in dense willow thickets across North America.
songbird
Greater Scaup
A rounded-headed diving duck of large open waters, the drake showing a glossy greenish-black head and pale gray back, closely resembling the smaller Lesser Scaup.
waterfowl
Lesser Scaup
North America's most abundant diving duck, closely resembling the Greater Scaup but with a peaked crown and a purplish (rather than greenish) head gloss.
waterfowl
White-crowned Sparrow
A crisply marked sparrow with bold black-and-white crown stripes, a plain gray breast, and a pink or yellowish bill.
songbird
Black-faced Bunting
A small bunting with an olive-grey head, a black face and throat in breeding males, and yellowish-olive underparts.
songbird
Shy Albatross
A pale, white-headed mollymawk that breeds only on a handful of islands off Tasmania, identifiable by its grey-washed nape and pale yellowish bill.
seabird
Japanese Tit
A cheerful East Asian tit with a glossy black head, white cheek patches, and a bold black stripe down its yellowish-white underside.
songbird
Cordilleran Flycatcher
A yellowish interior-mountain flycatcher virtually identical to the Pacific-slope Flycatcher, found in shaded coniferous canyons of the Rockies and Great Basin.
songbird
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