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.
Common Pochard
The Common Pochard is a Eurasian diving duck notable for the male's warm chestnut head and contrasting black breast, set against a pale, finely patterned gray body.
waterfowl
Common Myna
A bold, adaptable brown songbird with a glossy black head and bright yellow bare skin patch around the eye, now established in cities across much of the world.
songbird
Common Murre
A slender, upright seabird resembling a small penguin in posture, with chocolate-brown upperparts and clean white underparts, breeding in dense colonies on narrow sea cliffs.
seabird
Common Goldeneye
The Common Goldeneye is a striking black-and-white diving duck named for its piercing golden-yellow eye, with males showing a round white spot on an otherwise glossy dark green head.
waterfowl
Common Eider
The Common Eider is a large, heavy-bodied sea duck whose male shows a striking white back and breast against a black belly and crown, with a distinctive sloping bill-and-head profile.
waterfowl
Common Chiffchaff
A tiny, plain olive-brown warbler best known by its song, with dark legs and only faint facial markings — one of the least boldly patterned small European songbirds.
songbird
Common Buzzard
The Common Buzzard is a medium-large soaring raptor with broad, fingered wing feathers and a highly variable brown plumage, ranging from very dark to pale, that makes each individual's feathers somewhat distinct.
raptor
Common Bulbul
A widespread African songbird with plain brown plumage, a darker cap, and a bright yellow vent, common in gardens, scrub, and savanna woodlands.
songbird
Common Bronzewing
A widespread Australian woodland pigeon named for the shimmering bronze-and-green iridescent patches across its folded wings, set off by a pale cream forehead.
dove pigeon
Common Blackbird
A familiar thrush of European gardens, with males showing sleek all-black plumage and a bright bill, while females and juveniles are a more camouflaged sooty brown with subtle mottling.
songbird
Common Peafowl Spalding
An aviculture strain blending Green and Indian Peafowl ancestry, showing iridescent scaled neck feathers, a tall crest, and a long ornamental train that draws on the coloring of both parent lines.
gamebird
Common Wood Pigeon
Europe's largest common pigeon, easily identified by its soft blue-grey feathers, a bold white wing bar, and white neck patches absent in smaller relatives.
dove pigeon
Common Green Magpie
A vividly green forest corvid with a bold black mask and chestnut wing patch, whose color can fade toward blue in old feathers.
corvid
Blue Bunting
A deep-blue forest bunting of Mexico and Central America, males show brighter blue highlights on the crown, cheek, and rump against an overall dark blue body.
songbird
Common Black Hawk
A stocky, broad-winged hawk of wooded streams and mangroves, easily told from other dark raptors by its nearly all-black plumage crossed by a single wide white tail band.
raptor
Common Ringed Plover
The Eurasian counterpart to the Semipalmated Plover, a small brown-and-white plover with a single black breast band, breeding across the Arctic and temperate coasts of the Old World.
shorebird
Common Hill Myna
A glossy black forest myna of South and Southeast Asia, recognized by bright yellow fleshy wattles on the head and a bold white wing patch visible in flight.
songbird
Common Ground Dove
One of the smallest doves in North America, a diminutive, scaly-patterned bird that flushes from the ground to reveal a flash of rufous in the wings.
dove pigeon
Common Green Pigeon
The Common Green Pigeon is a widespread South Asian pigeon combining yellowish-green plumage with a grey mantle and bright yellow legs.
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
Blue Crane
South Africa's national bird, a pale blue-grey crane with unusually long, trailing wing-tip feathers that can nearly brush the ground when the bird is standing.
wading bird
Eurasian Blue Tit
A small, brightly colored garden tit with a blue crown and wings, yellow underparts, and white cheeks bordered by a thin black eye-line, among the most colorful common feathers in European gardens.
songbird
Little Blue Heron
A heron with a striking life-history twist: pure white as a juvenile, then molting into a deep slate-purple plumage as an adult.
wading bird
Great Blue Heron
The largest heron in North America, a slow-stalking hunter of shallow water with a slate-blue body and a dagger-like yellow bill.
wading bird