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.
Collared Forest Falcon
A large, owl-faced Neotropical forest raptor with short rounded wings and a long barred tail, known for a dark neck collar and loud calls echoing through the forest at dawn and dusk.
raptor
Daurian Jackdaw
A small East Asian jackdaw that comes in a striking pied form with a white collar and belly, alongside an all-dark morph that resembles other jackdaws.
corvid
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
Dark-eyed Junco
A familiar winter feeder bird, the Dark-eyed Junco flashes bright white outer tail feathers against a slate-gray or brown body when it flies.
songbird
Common Bullfinch
A stocky, shy woodland finch with males showing rosy-pink underparts against a blue-grey back and black cap, and both sexes sharing a bold white rump patch that flashes distinctively in flight.
songbird
Dark-breasted Rosefinch
An unusually plain rosefinch, lacking the streaking typical of the group, with a dusky rosy-brown body and only a subtle pink wash.
songbird
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
Crowned Eagle
The Crowned Eagle is a powerful African forest eagle with rich rufous underparts boldly barred in black, a strongly banded black-and-white tail, and a small crest, all adaptations for hunting beneath a dense forest canopy.
raptor
Collared Crow
A large, distinctive East Asian crow with a bold white band across the nape, neck, and breast set against black plumage.
corvid
Crimson-winged Finch
A robust mountain finch whose brown, streaked body is set off by broad crimson-pink panels across the wings.
songbird
Collared Aracari
The Collared Aracari is a mid-sized toucan with bright yellow underparts crossed by a dark belt of spots, plus a narrow chestnut collar across the nape. It ranges through Central American and northern South American forests in small, active flocks.
other
Crimson Topaz
One of the largest and most spectacular hummingbirds, the Crimson Topaz shows a glowing ruby-red body and long, crossed golden tail feathers in adult males.
hummingbird
Colima Warbler
A plain gray-brown warbler with a bright rufous-orange undertail patch, found in the United States only in high-elevation oak-pine canyons of a single mountain range.
songbird
Crimson Sunbird
A vividly colored South and Southeast Asian sunbird whose males combine brilliant crimson plumage with a metallic green crown and elongated central tail feathers.
songbird
Cocoi Heron
The South American counterpart to the Great Blue Heron, with a bold black cap and crisp white neck.
wading bird
Crimson-collared Grosbeak
A striking forest songbird of Mexico and Central America, the male Crimson-collared Grosbeak is mostly black with a bold crimson-red collar, breast, and rump.
songbird
Cockatiel
A slender, crested Australian parrot with soft grey plumage, a bold white wing patch, and, in males, a yellow face marked by a bright orange cheek spot.
parrot
Crested Serpent Eagle
A forest raptor of South and Southeast Asia with bare yellow facial skin and a bushy nape crest, best identified by its single broad white tail band and white-spotted underparts.
raptor
Galah
A distinctive two-toned cockatoo with a rose-pink face and underparts contrasting sharply against pale grey wings and back.
parrot
Crested Oropendola
A large, glossy black oropendola with a bright yellow tail, a pale ivory bill, and a small feathered crest, widespread across lowland forests of South America.
songbird
Fulvous-breasted Woodpecker
A small South Asian pied woodpecker whose warm, buffy-fulvous breast streaking sets it apart from the whiter underparts of related pied woodpeckers.
woodpecker
Crested Bunting
A South and Southeast Asian bunting easily told from all relatives by its glossy black body, chestnut wings, and prominent pointed crest.
songbird
Fraser's Eagle-Owl
Fraser's Eagle-Owl is a rufous-brown forest owl of West and Central Africa, densely barred throughout and equipped with prominent ear tufts suited to life in dense rainforest.
owl
Forster's Tern
A North American marsh tern with notably pale, frosty primaries and a distinctive nonbreeding head pattern featuring a dark patch through the eye rather than a full black cap.
seabird
Cream-colored Woodpecker
An unusually pale Amazonian woodpecker, clothed almost entirely in a uniform creamy-straw color rather than the bold contrast typical of most woodpeckers.
woodpecker
Fox Sparrow
A large, richly colored sparrow whose reddish tail and heavily spotted breast make its feathers among the most distinctive of any North American sparrow.
songbird
Costa's Hummingbird
A desert hummingbird whose male sports a brilliant violet-purple throat patch that flares outward into elongated points like a mustache.
hummingbird
Fork-tailed Sunbird
A small sunbird of southern China and Southeast Asia named for its notched, forked tail, with males showing a scarlet throat and iridescent green crown.
songbird
Corn Bunting
The Corn Bunting is a large, stocky, and plainly streaked farmland bunting, with brown-and-buff feathers that lack the bright colors of its relatives but show a heavy, seed-cracking bill.
songbird
Florida Scrub-Jay
A blue-and-grey jay found only in Florida's fire-maintained scrub oak habitat, lacking a crest and closely tied to a single, shrinking ecosystem.
corvid
Cooper's Hawk
Cooper's Hawk is a woodland accipiter with short rounded wings and a long, broadly banded tail, adult plumage showing blue-grey upperparts and fine rufous barring below, well suited to fast pursuit through trees.
raptor
Fish Crow
A slender, glossy all-black corvid of coastal and riverine eastern North America, distinguished from the larger American Crow mainly by voice and slightly smaller size.
corvid
Connecticut Warbler
A large, elusive warbler with a full gray hood and a bold, complete white eye-ring, known for walking rather than hopping and for skulking through dense low vegetation.
songbird
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
Common Yellowthroat
A small, skulking warbler best known for the male's bold black facial mask bordered in white, paired with a bright yellow throat.
songbird
Fieldfare
A boldly patterned, multi-toned thrush combining a grey head and rump with a chestnut back and black tail, often seen in large winter flocks across open farmland.
songbird
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
Field Sparrow
A small, subtly marked sparrow of old fields whose soft rufous-brown and gray feathers lack bold streaking, standing out mainly for their clean, quiet coloring.
songbird
Common Whitethroat
A small, active warbler with a bright white throat contrasting a grey head, and warm chestnut fringes on the wing feathers that add color to an otherwise modest bird.
songbird
Ferruginous Hawk
The Ferruginous Hawk is the largest North American buteo, with rich rufous ('ferruginous') back and leg feathers, a pale head and underparts, and a whitish tail, adapted to hunting over open, arid grassland.
raptor
Common Swift
The Common Swift is an almost entirely aerial bird with long, scythe-like flight feathers and uniformly sooty-brown plumage, built for a life spent on the wing far more than any songbird.
other
Fernandina's Flicker
An uncommon Cuban endemic flicker with subtly barred brown plumage, found in palm savanna and adjacent open woodland.
woodpecker
Common Snipe
The Eurasian counterpart of Wilson's Snipe, sharing the same superb camouflage pattern and winnowing tail-feather display, distinguished mainly by subtle wing and tail feather details assessable in the hand.
shorebird
Falcated Duck
An East Asian dabbling duck; breeding males show an iridescent bronze-green head and dramatically elongated, sickle-shaped tertial feathers drooping over the tail, unmatched by any other duck.
waterfowl
Common Scoter
The Common Scoter is the Eurasian counterpart of the Black Scoter, a sea duck whose breeding male is entirely black apart from a yellow-orange patch along the ridge of the bill.
waterfowl
European Turtle Dove
A small, warmly colored migratory dove with a tortoiseshell-patterned wing and a neat black-and-white striped neck patch found in no other common European dove.
dove pigeon
Common Rosefinch
A finch in which breeding males show a rosy-red head, breast, and rump, while females and immatures are plain streaked brown, sparrow-like birds.
songbird
European Serin
A tiny, streaky yellow-green finch with a short stubby bill and a bright yellow face and rump in breeding males.
songbird