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.
Masked Lapwing
A large, boldly patterned Australasian plover, the Masked Lapwing is best known for its striking yellow facial wattles and sharp wing spurs, with plain brown-and-white feathers that contrast with its ornate bare-part features.
shorebird
Mexican Chickadee
The Mexican Chickadee is a mountain specialist found in high-elevation pine forests, notable for its extensive black bib that extends further down the chest than in most other chickadees.
songbird
Masked Duck
A small, secretive stiff-tailed duck; breeding males are rich cinnamon densely marked with black spots and a black facial mask, while females are duller brown with striped faces.
waterfowl
Melodious Blackbird
An all-black songbird of Mexico and Central America, notable for its subtly glossy plumage, stout bill, and rich duetting song delivered in pairs.
songbird
Masked Booby
The largest booby species, with a clean white body set off by black flight feathers, a black tail, and a dark facial mask around the bill.
seabird
McKay's Bunting
McKay's Bunting is a rare, nearly all-white Arctic songbird breeding only on a few remote Bering Sea islands, closely related to and even whiter than the Snow Bunting.
songbird
Martial Eagle
The Martial Eagle is Africa's largest eagle, with dark grey-brown upperparts, a white underside heavily spotted with brown-black, and immense broad wings built for powerful soaring over savanna.
raptor
Marvelous Spatuletail
An extremely rare Peruvian hummingbird whose male carries just four tail feathers, two of them reduced to long bare wires tipped with glossy violet-blue paddles that cross during display.
hummingbird
Marsh Tit
A plain-plumaged woodland tit with a small, neat glossy black cap and bib set against pale buff-brown body feathers, with plain wings lacking any wingbar.
songbird
Marsh Wren
A small, vocal wren of cattail marshes, identified by its bold black-and-white streaked back and habit of singing loudly from within dense reed cover.
songbird
Marsh Owl
The Marsh Owl is a plain, tawny-brown ground-nesting owl of African grasslands and marshes, distinguished by its inconspicuous ear tufts and preference for open, low vegetation.
owl
Marsh Sandpiper
A delicate, needle-billed shorebird with very long thin legs, resembling a miniature greenshank in both shape and pale coloring.
shorebird
Malachite Kingfisher
A jewel-toned African kingfisher with an electric-blue back and a shaggy blue-and-black crest, often seen perched low over quiet water.
other
Marbled Godwit
The largest North American godwit, with an overall warm cinnamon-buff plumage finely barred with dark markings and a long, slightly upturned bicolored bill.
shorebird
Major Mitchell's Cockatoo
A pale pink cockatoo of Australia's arid interior, best known for its spectacular crest banded with red, yellow, and white when raised.
parrot
Marabou Stork
A massive African scavenging stork with a bald pink head, an enormous bill, and a dangling throat pouch, often seen alongside vultures at carcasses and rubbish dumps.
wading bird
Magnolia Warbler
A small, boldly patterned wood-warbler with a black "necklace" of streaking on a yellow breast, breeding in northern conifer forests.
songbird
Manx Shearwater
A slim, black-and-white seabird known for its low, banking flight that alternately flashes dark upperparts and white underparts as it 'shears' over waves.
seabird
Magnificent Frigatebird
A large, aerial seabird with long angular wings and a deeply forked tail, glossy black in males and marked with a white breast patch in females.
seabird
Maned Goose
A stocky, pale grey Australian goose with a small dark bill and mostly terrestrial habits, grazing on grasslands near the coast.
waterfowl
Magellanic Woodpecker
A spectacular, crow-sized woodpecker of Patagonian beech forests, with the male's entire head blazing red and crowned by a distinctive forward-curling crest.
woodpecker
Mandarin Duck
An East Asian perching duck famed for the male's uniquely upright orange 'sail' feathers on the wing, among the most distinctive single feathers of any bird in the world.
waterfowl
MacGillivray's Warbler
A western skulking warbler closely resembling the Mourning Warbler but distinguished by bold broken white crescents above and below the eye.
songbird
Mallard
The world's most familiar duck, identifiable from almost any single wing feather by its glossy blue speculum bordered in white, shared by both sexes.
waterfowl
Madagascar Turtle Dove
A grey-brown dove of Madagascar and nearby islands, easily told by the neat black-and-white striped patch on the sides of its neck.
dove pigeon
Malachite Sunbird
A large African sunbird whose breeding males are covered in brilliant iridescent green plumage with long tail streamers, while females and non-breeding males show a much plainer, brownish, streaked appearance.
songbird
Long-tailed Tit
A tiny, round-bodied tit with an extraordinarily long tail exceeding its body length, patterned in black, white, and soft dusky pink, among the most distinctive silhouettes in European woodland.
songbird
Magpie-lark
A common Australian black-and-white songbird, the Magpie-lark shows bold facial and body markings that differ between males and females, and is frequently seen foraging near water on open ground.
songbird
Long-tailed Sylph
An Andean cloud-forest hummingbird whose male trails an extravagantly long, deeply forked, iridescent blue-green tail far exceeding the length of its body.
hummingbird
Madagascar Kestrel
A small, adaptable island kestrel whose rufous, black-spotted feathers make it one of the most recognizable raptors found across Madagascar's varied habitats.
raptor
Long-tailed Rosefinch
A rosefinch distinguished by its unusually long, graduated tail combined with pink and grey-brown streaked plumage in males.
songbird
Lucy's Warbler
One of the smallest and palest North American warblers, essentially plain gray and white apart from a bright rufous rump patch and a concealed rufous crown spot.
songbird
Long-tailed Meadowlark
A southern South American grassland songbird whose males flash a brilliant scarlet throat and breast against blackish upperparts.
songbird
Louisiana Waterthrush
A large, stream-loving warbler with an unmarked white throat and warm buffy flanks, closely tied to clear, rocky, fast-moving woodland streams.
songbird
Long-tailed Jaeger
The smallest, slimmest, and most elegant jaeger, breeding adults trailing exceptionally long, thin central tail streamers behind a slender, buoyant body.
seabird
Loten's Sunbird
A South Asian sunbird notable for its unusually long, strongly decurved bill and a male plumage of iridescent purple-green with a maroon chest band.
songbird
Long-billed Dowitcher
A close relative of the Short-billed Dowitcher with a proportionally longer bill and more extensively barred, deeper rufous breeding underparts, generally favoring freshwater habitats over saline coastal flats.
shorebird
Long-tailed Duck
The Long-tailed Duck is a distinctive sea duck known for the male's elongated central tail feathers and an unusually complex sequence of plumages that change more often than in any other duck.
waterfowl
Long-billed Corella
A white Australian cockatoo with an unusually long, curved upper bill, the Long-billed Corella shows more extensive pink-red coloring on the face and breast than its close relatives.
parrot
Long-legged Buzzard
A pale, long-winged buzzard of arid steppe and semi-desert across Eurasia and North Africa, told from similar hawks by its usually unbarred rufous tail and bold dark carpal patches.
raptor
Long-billed Curlew
North America's largest shorebird, the Long-billed Curlew shows warm cinnamon-buff plumage and an extraordinarily long, downcurved bill, with feathers that echo the buffy tones of dry grassland.
shorebird
Long-eared Owl
A slender, well-camouflaged owl best known for its long, closely set ear tufts and richly streaked orange-brown plumage, roosting communally in dense conifer stands.
owl
Loggerhead Shrike
A compact gray predator songbird with a black bandit mask and a hooked bill, known for impaling prey on thorns and barbed wire.
songbird
Long-billed Hermit
A large hermit hummingbird of Central American rainforest understory, identified by its long decurved bill, buffy underparts, and elongated white-tipped central tail feathers.
hummingbird
Little Wattlebird
The Little Wattlebird is a large, grey-brown honeyeater with a rufous wing patch and a long tail, best known for its harsh, coughing calls.
songbird
Little Tern
The Old World counterpart to the Least Tern, a tiny, fast-flying species of European, African, and Asian coasts, distinguished by its small size, yellow bill, and bold white forehead patch.
seabird
Little Spiderhunter
A plain-plumaged relative of sunbirds recognized by its very long, curved bill and bright yellow underparts, common near banana plants across South and Southeast Asia.
songbird
Little Stint
One of the smallest sandpipers, the Little Stint shows warm rufous-fringed feathers and pale mantle lines in breeding plumage, a delicate miniature counterpart to larger calidrids across Eurasia and Africa.
shorebird