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.
Pinyon Jay
A uniformly blue, short-tailed, crestless jay of the western pinyon-juniper woodlands, famous for its large nomadic flocks and close relationship with pine seeds.
corvid
Nelson's Sparrow
A softly patterned marsh sparrow with a blurry orange face and grayish back streaking, found in both interior and coastal wetlands.
songbird
Pink-footed Goose
A compact gray goose with a notably darker head and neck than its body, a short pink-banded bill, and pink legs, breeding in the far North Atlantic and wintering on European farmland.
waterfowl
New Zealand Bellbird
The New Zealand Bellbird is an olive-green honeyeater-relative renowned for its clear, bell-like song, common in native forest across New Zealand.
songbird
Rainbow Bee-eater
Australia's only bee-eater, a multicolored bird combining green, gold, and turquoise plumage with a fine black tail streamer.
other
New Holland Honeyeater
The New Holland Honeyeater is a boldly streaked black-and-white honeyeater with flashing yellow wing panels, common in heath and gardens across southern Australia.
songbird
Pyrrhuloxia
A desert relative of the Northern Cardinal, the Pyrrhuloxia is soft gray overall with splashes of red on the crest, face, and underparts, plus a distinctive stubby yellow bill.
songbird
Muscovy Duck
A large, heavily built duck; wild birds are glossy black-green with white wing patches, while the widely domesticated and feral forms show highly variable pied black-and-white plumage.
waterfowl
Purple-throated Carib
A Lesser Antillean hummingbird whose deep green body sets off a brilliant magenta-purple throat patch that can look nearly black until it catches direct light.
hummingbird
Mourning Warbler
A skulking, gray-hooded warbler of dense thickets, with adult males showing a dark, mottled patch across the throat and upper breast and no eye-ring.
songbird
Purple Martin
The largest North American swallow, with males showing an all-over glossy blue-black sheen and females a duller gray-brown, pale-bellied pattern.
songbird
Mrs. Gould's Sunbird
A vividly multicolored Himalayan and Southeast Asian sunbird, males showing a crimson back, yellow rump, and long purple-blue tail streamers.
songbird
Purple-rumped Sunbird
A small, brightly patterned South Asian sunbird recognized by its maroon back, glittering purple rump patch, and yellow underparts.
songbird
Mourning Dove
A common, slender dove whose long, pointed, white-edged tail feathers and soft muted tan-brown coloring make it a familiar sight and sound across open country.
dove pigeon
Purple Heron
A slim, secretive relative of the Grey Heron with rich chestnut neck feathering and a habit of hiding among tall reeds.
wading bird
Mountain Quail
The largest quail native to North America, instantly recognized by the single thin, straight plume that projects from its crown.
gamebird
Puerto Rican Woodpecker
An island-endemic woodpecker found only in Puerto Rico, showing a bold black chest band across an otherwise pale, cream-colored underside.
woodpecker
Mountain Imperial Pigeon
The Mountain Imperial Pigeon is a large, heavy-bodied forest pigeon with pale grey underparts contrasting against a deep maroon-brown back and wings.
dove pigeon
Puerto Rican Screech-Owl
The Puerto Rican Screech-Owl, locally known as the mucaro, is a small island-endemic owl with soft reddish-brown or grey-brown plumage and a rounded, nearly tuftless head.
owl
Mountain Bluebird
A slender, sky-blue songbird of western North American high country, the male appearing almost entirely blue with no rusty breast patch, unlike its bluebird relatives.
songbird
Princess Parrot
The Princess Parrot is a slender, pastel-colored parrot of Australia's arid interior, notable for its soft pink throat and long, elegant tail.
parrot
Mottled Owl
A medium-sized, ear-tuftless wood owl of Neotropical forest, its feathers finely mottled in dark and pale brown, with whitish eyebrows and buffy, streaked underparts.
owl
Pacific Screech-Owl
A small eared owl of Pacific lowland Central America, with greyish-brown streaked plumage and pale eyebrows meeting above the bill.
owl
Mountain Caracara
A bold, high-altitude Andean raptor with black upperparts and breast set against a clean white belly and rump, often seen scavenging near mountain settlements and livestock.
raptor
Pel's Fishing Owl
Pel's Fishing Owl is a large, rufous-chestnut African owl specialized for hunting fish along rivers and lakes, with bare, unfeathered legs and feet unlike most owls.
owl
Montezuma Oropendola
One of the largest New World songbirds, with a rich chestnut body, black head, a long graduated tail tipped in bright yellow, and a distinctive bicolored bill.
songbird
Orange Dove
A Fijian fruit dove in which males glow a vivid, almost flame-like orange from head to tail, while females remain camouflaged in typical fruit-dove green.
dove pigeon
Montezuma Quail
A round, secretive quail of southwestern grasslands, with males showing one of the boldest black-and-white facial patterns of any North American gamebird.
gamebird
Palm Warbler
A ground-foraging wood-warbler with a rufous cap in breeding plumage and constant tail-bobbing, breeding in northern bogs and wintering in the southeastern US.
songbird
Montagu's Harrier
Montagu's Harrier is the slimmest and most lightly built of the Eurasian harriers, males pale grey with a distinctive black wing-bar, and females and juveniles rufous-brown, all adapted to graceful, buoyant flight over open farmland and steppe.
raptor
Pied Crow
A striking black crow of sub-Saharan Africa, instantly recognizable by its bold white breast and neck collar.
corvid
Mongolian Finch
A pale, sandy-toned finch of Central Asian deserts and steppe, showing a subtle rosy wash across the rump and wings.
songbird
Picui Ground Dove
A small, pale ground dove of open southern South American country, marked by neat blackish spots on its wing coverts and flashes of blue-grey in flight.
dove pigeon
Monk Parakeet
A green South American parakeet with a distinctive grey, scalloped breast, unique among parrots for building large communal stick nests rather than nesting in cavities.
parrot
Painted Stork
A large South Asian stork with a white-and-black body, a bold black breast band, and delicate pink-tinged wing plumes, identified further by its long, decurved yellow bill and bare orange face.
wading bird
Moluccan Cockatoo
A large cockatoo with pale pinkish-white plumage and a spectacular salmon-orange crest that fans wide when raised.
parrot
Painted Francolin
A ground-dwelling gamebird of central and southern India with dark brown plumage densely marked with white spots and a chestnut nape patch.
gamebird
Mississippi Kite
The Mississippi Kite is a small, elegant grey kite with a pale head, darker grey back and wings, a solid black tail, and long pointed wings, often seen catching flying insects on the wing over open groves and parks.
raptor
Piapiac
A slender, glossy black African corvid with a long tail, often seen following cattle or large game to catch flushed insects.
corvid
Mikado Pheasant
A striking Taiwanese endemic pheasant, with males cloaked in glossy blue-black plumage set off by a bold white wing bar and a long, narrowly white-barred tail.
gamebird
Philadelphia Vireo
The Philadelphia Vireo is a small, plain-plumaged vireo of northern woodlands, often confused with the Warbling Vireo and Tennessee Warbler due to its subtle coloring.
songbird
Middle Spotted Woodpecker
A small, delicately patterned European woodpecker of old oak woodland, easily told from the Great Spotted Woodpecker by its unbroken red cap and streaked, rather than solidly barred, flanks.
woodpecker
Parasitic Jaeger
A sleek, agile seabird intermediate in size between the two other jaegers, identified in breeding adults by narrow, pointed central tail feathers and a swift, falcon-like flight.
seabird
Meyer's Parrot
Meyer's Parrot is a small, subtly colored African parrot with a brownish-grey body offset by a turquoise belly and yellow shoulder patches.
parrot
Pallid Harrier
A slender, long-distance migrant harrier of the Eurasian steppe, the palest of the gray harriers, with males showing a narrow black wedge at the wingtip and females a streaky brown 'ringtail' pattern.
raptor
Mexican Violetear
A vividly green montane hummingbird set apart by patches of violet-blue iridescence across the ear coverts and breast.
hummingbird
Pharaoh Eagle-Owl
A pale, sandy-toned eagle-owl of North African and Middle Eastern deserts, its feathers finely streaked and vermiculated to blend with rock and sand.
owl
Mexican Jay
A blue-and-grey jay of oak and pine-oak canyons in the southwestern US and Mexico, distinguished from similar scrub-jays by its plain grey underparts without a breast band.
corvid