Feather & Bird Encyclopedia
Search and identify feathers by species — with feather type, plumage, colours, size, habitat, and how to tell them apart in the field.
Northern Rough-winged Swallow
A plain brown swallow similar to Bank Swallow but lacking a sharp breast band, instead showing a soft, diffuse brownish wash across the throat.
songbird
Japanese Grosbeak
A large, heavy-billed finch of East Asian forests, recognized by its black head, gray-brown body, and oversized pale-yellow bill.
songbird
Meadow Pipit
The Meadow Pipit is a small, streaky brown songbird of open country, its cryptic, heavily streaked feathers providing camouflage against grass and heather.
songbird
Curve-billed Thrasher
A grayish-brown desert songbird with a long, strongly down-curved bill, well adapted to foraging among cactus and thorny scrub of the American Southwest.
songbird
Canyon Wren
A rufous-brown, cliff-dwelling wren with a striking bright white throat, best known for its cascading, silvery song that echoes through canyons.
songbird
Black Francolin
A boldly patterned gamebird with males showing black plumage dotted with white spots and a chestnut neck collar, while females are cryptically mottled brown.
gamebird
Hawaiian Crow
A critically rare Hawaiian corvid with softer, browner plumage than mainland crows, subject to intensive conservation efforts after disappearing from the wild.
corvid
Yellow-rumped Warbler
One of North America's most abundant warblers, easily known by small bright-yellow patches on the rump, sides, and crown set against streaky gray-brown feathers.
songbird
Russet-crowned Motmot
Found in dry forest of western Mexico, the Russet-crowned Motmot shows a warm rufous-brown crown against green body plumage and a slow-swinging racket tail.
other
Rock Ptarmigan
A circumpolar tundra grouse that turns from mottled gray-brown in summer to pure white in winter, always retaining black tail feathers as a year-round field mark.
gamebird
Pygmy Nuthatch
The Pygmy Nuthatch is a tiny, highly social western pine-forest nuthatch whose dull gray-brown cap and small feather size distinguish it from other nuthatches.
songbird
Pacific Wren
A tiny, dark rufous-brown wren of western old-growth forest understory, nearly identical to the Winter Wren but distinguished mainly by range and its distinctly different song.
songbird
Nightingale
The Nightingale is a plain brown songbird celebrated for its powerful, richly varied nighttime song, far more often heard than seen in dense thickets across Europe.
songbird
Chestnut-quilled Rock Pigeon
The Chestnut-quilled Rock Pigeon is an Australian escarpment specialist whose otherwise grey-brown plumage reveals bold chestnut patches on the flight feathers when it takes wing.
dove pigeon
Blue Grosbeak
A stocky North American bunting relative, the Blue Grosbeak shows deep blue plumage and chestnut wing bars in males, while females wear a warm, understated brown.
songbird
Eastern Towhee
A large, ground-dwelling sparrow relative with bold black (or brown), white, and rufous plumage, often first noticed scratching noisily through leaf litter in dense thickets.
songbird
Eastern Phoebe
A plain-plumaged flycatcher recognized more by its tail-wagging habit than bright colors, with grayish-brown feathers above and a faint yellow wash on white underparts.
songbird
Corn Bunting
The Corn Bunting is a large, stocky, and plainly streaked farmland bunting, with brown-and-buff feathers that lack the bright colors of its relatives but show a heavy, seed-cracking bill.
songbird
Hermit Thrush
A quiet, spot-breasted thrush best known for its habit of slowly raising and lowering its rufous tail, a useful clue among the similar brown Catharus thrushes.
songbird
Greater Rhea
A large flightless ratite of South American grasslands, with soft, loose grayish-brown plumage and a long neck, related more to ostriches and emus than to typical flying birds.
other
Gray Peacock-pheasant
A forest-floor pheasant of South and Southeast Asia whose gray-brown feathers are dotted with brilliant blue-green and purple eyespots, most striking across the spread tail.
gamebird
Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoo
A large, dark cockatoo of southeastern Australia, the Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoo shows blackish-brown plumage broken by bright yellow patches on the tail and cheek.
parrot
Vermilion Flycatcher
A small flycatcher in which males show a strikingly brilliant red crown and underparts against dusky brown wings, while females are far more subdued.
songbird
Ring-necked Dove
One of the most familiar doves across sub-Saharan Africa, soft grayish-brown overall with a neat black half-collar and a gentle, rhythmic call.
dove pigeon