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.
Baird's Sparrow
An elusive prairie sparrow with a warm ochre crown stripe and fine necklace-like streaking, tied closely to intact native grassland.
songbird
Bachman's Sparrow
Bachman's Sparrow is a secretive southeastern songbird best known for its long, sweet, whistled song delivered from a low perch in open pine woods.
songbird
Azure-winged Magpie
A slender, pastel-toned corvid with a black cap and soft blue wings and tail, common in flocks across East Asian woodland and parkland.
corvid
Aztec Thrush
The Aztec Thrush is a boldly patterned montane thrush of Mexican cloud forest, marked by striking white wing patches and white-tipped tail feathers against dark brown-black body plumage.
songbird
Australian Wood Duck
The Australian Wood Duck is a distinctive grazing duck, the male showing a dark chocolate-brown head with a low mane, often seen on pasture and grassland rather than open water.
waterfowl
Australian Pelican
The Australian Pelican is a huge, mostly white waterbird with black flight feathers and an enormous pink bill and throat pouch, a familiar sight on lakes, rivers, and coasts.
waterfowl
Australian Masked Owl
A large, variably colored barn-owl relative of Australian forests, ranging from pale to dark rufous, with a distinctive heart-shaped facial disc and fine spotting on its feathers.
owl
Australian Magpie
A boldly patterned black-and-white Australian songbird famous for its rich, warbling carol and confident presence in parks and farmland.
corvid
Australian Hobby
The Australian Hobby is a small, fast, dark-headed falcon resembling a miniature Peregrine, with slate-grey upperparts and rufous-orange underparts, common across open woodland and towns.
raptor
Australasian Gannet
A large white seabird with black wingtips and a warm yellow head wash, known for spectacular high-speed plunge-dives into the ocean.
seabird
Audubon's Oriole
A secretive oriole of dense riparian thickets, showing a solid black hood and wings against a yellow body, and best known for its slow, deliberate whistled song.
songbird
Atlantic Puffin
A small, tuxedo-patterned seabird famous for its large, brightly colored bill in the breeding season, spending most of the year far out at sea before returning to nest on coastal cliffs and islands.
seabird
Atlantic Canary
The wild ancestor of the domestic canary, a streaky yellow-green island finch native to the Canary Islands, Azores, and Madeira.
songbird
Asian Rosy-Finch
An alpine finch of Siberia, Kamchatka, and Japan's high mountains, showing brown body plumage, a variable grey head patch, and pink-washed wings.
songbird
Ash-throated Flycatcher
A pale desert-country flycatcher with an ashy-gray throat, soft yellow belly wash, and a rufous tail that flashes when it flies.
songbird
Andean Siskin
A modestly plumaged high-Andean finch with streaky brown-olive feathering, adapted to cold paramo grasslands rather than showy display.
songbird
Andean Flicker
A high-altitude flicker of the Andes that has largely abandoned trees, foraging and nesting on open ground and earthen banks.
woodpecker
Andean Emerald
A clean-looking Andean hummingbird combining a glittering green throat and back with notably pale, whitish underparts and a tail showing a blue tinge.
hummingbird
Andean Condor
The largest raptor by wingspan in the world, with mostly black plumage set off by a white neck ruff and bold white upperwing patches in males.
raptor
Andean Cock-of-the-rock
A dazzling orange songbird of Andean cloud forest, males display a flattened, half-moon crest that nearly conceals the bill, gathering at communal leks to court females.
songbird
Amur Falcon
The Amur Falcon is a small migratory falcon breeding in eastern Asia and famed for an enormous transoceanic migration to southern Africa, closely resembling the related Red-footed Falcon.
raptor
American Woodcock
A round, forest-dwelling shorebird with dead-leaf camouflage plumage, an oversized bill, and unusually short, rounded wings that produce a distinctive twittering whistle in flight.
shorebird
American White Pelican
A massive, brilliant white pelican with strikingly black flight feathers visible in flight, one of the largest birds in North America.
seabird
American Tree Sparrow
A hardy winter sparrow of snowy fields, recognizable by its rufous cap and the single dark spot centered on an otherwise plain gray breast.
songbird
American Redstart
An active wood-warbler that flashes bright orange or yellow patches on its wings and tail while fanning them to startle insects into flight.
songbird
American Herring Gull
The North American counterpart to the Eurasian Herring Gull, the American Herring Gull shows very similar pale gray-and-white plumage with black wingtip spots, but with subtly darker gray tones and pinkish legs.
seabird
American Goldfinch
The American Goldfinch is famous for males turning vivid lemon-yellow with black wings and cap in breeding season, then molting to a dull olive plumage the rest of the year.
songbird
American Golden-Plover
A striking long-distance migrant plover whose breeding plumage combines gold-and-black spangled upperparts with solid black underparts bordered by a bold white stripe.
shorebird
American Flamingo
A vividly colored flamingo of the Caribbean region, showing some of the deepest pink-to-orange body plumage of any flamingo species.
wading bird
American Black Duck
A large, dark dabbling duck of eastern North America that resembles a female Mallard but is much darker overall, with a contrasting pale head and white underwings visible in flight.
waterfowl
American Bittern
A secretive, superbly camouflaged heron of North American marshes that freezes with its bill pointed skyward to blend into the reeds.
wading bird
American Barn Owl
A pale, heart-faced owl of open farmland and grassland, instantly recognizable by its golden and grey speckled upperparts, ghostly white underside, and exceptionally soft, silent-flight feathers.
owl
American Avocet
An elegant black-and-white wader with a distinctive upturned bill, showing a rusty cinnamon head and neck in breeding season.
shorebird
Alpine Chough
A glossy black mountain corvid with a short yellow bill, often seen soaring at very high altitudes near cliffs and mountain huts.
corvid
Alexandrine Parakeet
One of the largest Psittacula parakeets, distinguished from the similar Rose-ringed Parakeet by its bigger size, heavier red bill, and a distinctive maroon-red patch on the shoulder.
parrot
Albert's Lyrebird
A rarer relative of the Superb Lyrebird found only in a small area of eastern Australia, Albert's Lyrebird has a more subdued rufous-brown plumage and a less elaborate but still distinctive ornamental tail.
songbird
Agami Heron
A slender, secretive forest heron with a strikingly long neck and bill, dark green back, chestnut underparts, and long, delicate breeding plumes.
wading bird
African Spoonbill
An all-white African wading bird with a red face and legs, identified by its plain white plumage and grey spoon-shaped bill without a crest.
wading bird
African Pygmy Falcon
One of the smallest raptors in the world, this tiny falcon of African thornveld shows crisp white underparts against a grey or chestnut back, often nesting alongside colonial weaverbirds.
raptor
African Openbill
A dark, glossy African stork with the same distinctive mandible gap as its Asian relative, blending into the shadows of marshes and swamps where it specializes in extracting aquatic snails.
wading bird
African Harrier-Hawk
A distinctive gray African raptor known for its bare, color-changing facial skin and unusually flexible double-jointed legs, used to probe tree holes and nests for prey.
raptor
African Grass Owl
A ground-nesting barn-owl relative of African montane grassland and marsh, dark chocolate-brown above with fine pale spotting, and long legs suited to hunting low over dense grass.
owl
African Fish Eagle
A strikingly tricolor eagle of African waters, with a crisp white head, chest, and tail set sharply against rich chestnut body plumage and black flight feathers.
raptor
African Collared-Dove
A pale, sandy-toned dove of African savanna and scrub, best known as the wild ancestor of the domesticated ring-necked dove.
dove pigeon
Acorn Woodpecker
A social, boldly patterned oak-woodland woodpecker famous for hoarding acorns by the thousands in specially drilled storage trees.
woodpecker
Abyssinian Roller
A vividly blue roller of the African Sahel, similar to the Lilac-breasted Roller but with a plainer blue throat and longer tail streamers.
other
Abyssinian Ground Hornbill
The Abyssinian Ground Hornbill is a large, mostly terrestrial hornbill of Sub-Saharan African savanna north of the equator, similar in shape to its southern counterpart but distinguished by its bare blue facial and throat skin. It walks in small groups across open country hunting for prey.
other
Plumbeous Forest Falcon
A small, threatened forest-falcon restricted to the humid Chocó region of Colombia and Ecuador, resembling its more widespread relatives but confined to a much smaller range.
raptor