Bird Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ birds — with size, habitat, diet, voice, behavior, and the field marks that tell them apart.
Western Grebe
A large, elegant black-and-white grebe with a long swan-like neck, famous for its dramatic rushing courtship dance across the water.
waterfowl
Tundra Swan
A medium-sized white swan of the Arctic tundra, often showing a small yellow spot near the bill, that winters in large flocks on coastal wetlands.
waterfowl
Whooper Swan
A large Eurasian swan with a yellow-and-black bill and a loud, bugling voice, breeding across the far north and famed for long migratory flights.
waterfowl
Wild Turkey
North America's largest gamebird, a bronze-iridescent forest turkey famous for the male's fanned tail and booming spring gobble.
gamebird
White-winged Chough
A glossy black, red-eyed Australian woodland bird that forages in noisy cooperative flocks and flashes white wing patches in flight.
songbird
Swainson's Hawk
A long-winged prairie hawk famous for one of the longest migrations of any North American raptor, traveling all the way to the pampas of Argentina.
raptor
Swallow Tanager
A short-billed, swallow-shaped tanager, with turquoise-blue males and grass-green females, that hawks insects on the wing and nests in burrows.
songbird
White-plumed Honeyeater
A small olive-yellow honeyeater with a slender white crescent-shaped plume on the side of the neck, common near inland rivers and eucalypts.
songbird
Sociable Weaver
A small Kalahari finch-weaver famous for building the largest communal stick nests of any bird, sometimes housing hundreds of pairs.
songbird
Quaker Parrot
A grey-faced South American parakeet uniquely known for building large communal stick nests rather than nesting in tree cavities.
parrot
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
A tiny, plain-faced olive-gray songbird with a bold white eye-ring and a surprisingly loud, rollicking song from a normally hidden red crown.
songbird
Sandhill Crane
A tall grey North American crane with a bare red crown, best known for the spectacular mass migration gatherings along the Platte River.
wading-bird
Pine Siskin
A small, heavily streaked brown finch with sharp yellow wing and tail markings, notorious for unpredictable winter irruptions.
songbird
Sun Conure
A vividly orange-and-yellow Neotropical parakeet of northeastern South America, prized for its striking sunset-colored plumage.
parrot
Scaled Quail
A bluish-gray desert quail nicknamed "cottontop" for its bushy white crest, with feathers edged to create a distinctive scaly look.
gamebird
Rusty Blackbird
A boreal-breeding blackbird that turns rusty-edged in fall plumage, now one of the most steeply declining songbirds in North America.
songbird
Silver-beaked Tanager
A velvety deep-red South American tanager with a glowing crimson rump and a pale, silvery lower mandible that gives the species its name.
songbird
Olive Warbler
A pine-forest specialist with a tawny-orange head and black mask, now classified in its own unique family separate from true warblers.
songbird
Spectacled Owl
A large, dark-headed owl named for the bold white "spectacles" that ring its eyes, with a strikingly different all-white juvenile plumage.
owl
Southern Brown Kiwi
A shaggy, flightless, nocturnal New Zealand kiwi of the South Island and Stewart Island, known locally as tokoeka, that finds food entirely by smell.
other
Striated Heron
A small, stocky, dark greenish heron found on tropical shorelines worldwide, notable for occasionally using bait to lure fish.
wading-bird
Red-footed Booby
The smallest and most variably plumaged booby, easily told by its bright red feet and habit of nesting in trees on remote tropical islands.
seabird
Montezuma Quail
A round, secretive southwestern quail with a bold black-and-white harlequin facial pattern that renders it nearly invisible in grass.
gamebird
Marsh Wren
A small, energetic wren of cattail marshes, known for its loud, gurgling song and the male's habit of building multiple decoy nests.
songbird