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.
Turkey Vulture
A widespread scavenger known for its two-toned wings, silvery flight feathers set against a dark body, and its habit of soaring in a shallow V with a distinctive teetering flight.
raptor
Egyptian Vulture
The smallest and most lightly built Old World vulture, with creamy-white body feathers, black flight feathers, and a distinctive wedge-shaped tail.
raptor
King Vulture
A striking tropical vulture with mostly creamy white plumage, jet-black flight and tail feathers, and a vividly multicolored bare head.
raptor
Cinereous Vulture
One of the heaviest flying raptors, with uniformly dark brown plumage, a dense dark ruff, and broad flight feathers adapted for soaring across open Eurasian terrain.
raptor
Lappet-faced Vulture
The largest vulture in Africa, with powerful build, mostly dark brown-black plumage, and a patch of contrasting white feathers on the thighs.
raptor
Palm-nut Vulture
An unusual, mostly white African vulture closely tied to oil palm groves and coastal wetlands, with black flight feathers and a partly black tail breaking up its pale plumage.
raptor
Black Vulture
An all-black scavenger with a short, square tail and distinctive whitish patches near the wingtips, often seen circling in groups or gathered at carcasses.
raptor
Zone-tailed Hawk
A blackish hawk that closely mimics the flight silhouette and dark coloring of the Turkey Vulture, distinguished mainly by its banded tail feathers.
raptor
Vasa Parrot
A large, dark, unusually plain-plumaged parrot from Madagascar known for its loose, almost vulture-like feathering.
parrot
Firecrest
The Firecrest is one of Europe's smallest songbirds, a mite of a bird whose soft, downy contour feathers are topped with a blazing orange-and-black crown stripe unlike any similarly sized species.
songbird
Glaucous-winged Gull
A common gull of the North Pacific coast, the Glaucous-winged Gull shows pale gray wingtip feathers with little or no black, differing subtly from most other large gulls, and frequently hybridizes with related species.
seabird