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.
Red-and-green Macaw
One of the largest macaws, a vivid red parrot of South American forests with a green wing band, blue flight feathers, and a bare white face marked with thin lines of red feathers.
parrot
Bonaparte's Gull
A dainty, tern-like gull of the North American boreal forest, notable as one of the few gulls that nests in trees, and identifiable by its crisp black hood and bright white wing wedge.
seabird
Blue Jay
The Blue Jay is a large, vocal corvid whose bold blue, black-barred, white-tipped wing and tail feathers are among the most instantly recognizable of any North American songbird.
corvid
Red-crowned Woodpecker
A small, widespread woodpecker of northern South America with a barred black-and-white back and a bright red crown on males.
woodpecker
Trumpeter Swan
The heaviest native North American bird and largest swan, entirely white with a solid black bill, sometimes showing a rust-stained head from iron-rich feeding grounds.
waterfowl
Snowy Egret
A small, energetic white heron of the Americas known for its black bill, black legs, and bright yellow feet.
wading bird
Amazon Kingfisher
A large green-and-white kingfisher of tropical American waterways, with males showing a broad chestnut breast band that females lack in full. It hunts fish from perches overhanging rivers and streams.
other
Eurasian Teal
The Old World form of the common teal, closely related to the North American Green-winged Teal, told apart chiefly by a horizontal white scapular stripe rather than a vertical flank stripe.
waterfowl
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
A striking eastern songbird whose males show a bold black-and-white pattern set off by a triangular rose-red patch on the breast, one of the most distinctive feather patterns among North American songbirds.
songbird
Black Turnstone
A dark, sooty relative of the Ruddy Turnstone restricted to the Pacific coast of North America, showing a uniformly blackish body offset by a crisp white belly and bold white wing markings in flight.
shorebird
Common Gull
A neat, medium-sized gull of Europe and Asia known as Mew Gull in North American populations, the Common Gull shows pale gray back feathers, black wingtips with white spots, and a gentle, rounded head shape.
seabird
Ross's Goose
The smallest white goose in North America, nearly identical in color to the Snow Goose but noticeably more compact, with a short neck and stubby bill.
waterfowl
Tricolored Heron
A slender dark heron of the Americas, easily told from other dark herons by the crisp white line running down its foreneck and belly.
wading bird
Red-throated Caracara
A loud, glossy black rainforest raptor of the Amazon and Central America, with a bare red throat and face and a striking white belly patch, often heard before it is seen.
raptor
Grey-headed Dove
A quiet forest-floor dove of Central America, identified by its pale grey head, white throat, and a faint metallic sheen across the back of its neck.
dove pigeon
Horned Screamer
A large, turkey-sized waterbird of South American wetlands, unmistakable for the long, slender horn-like spine projecting from its forehead. Its blackish, white-speckled plumage and loud trumpeting calls carry across open marshland.
other
Northern Saw-whet Owl
One of the smallest owls in North America, with soft reddish-brown, white-streaked plumage, no ear tufts, and a distinctive whitish facial disc bordered by a dark rim.
owl
Campo Flicker
A grassland flicker of central South America with a bold white face and black chest patch, usually seen foraging on open ground rather than tree trunks.
woodpecker
Black Oystercatcher
A large, entirely dark shorebird of rocky Pacific coastlines, lacking any white in its plumage, unlike its pied relatives elsewhere in the Americas and Old World.
shorebird
Whooping Crane
The tallest bird in North America, an endangered white crane with black wingtips visible in flight and a bare red crown, best known for its dramatic conservation recovery story.
wading bird
Spotted Owl
An old-growth forest specialist of western North America, dark brown overall with distinctive rounded white spotting across its plumage, dependent on structurally complex mature forest.
owl
Flame-colored Tanager
A mountain-forest tanager of Mexico and Central America, the male Flame-colored Tanager combines orange-red body plumage with a distinctively black-streaked back and white wing bars.
songbird
Eurasian Collared-Dove
A pale, stocky dove readily identified by the black half-collar on its nape and its square tail's bold white terminal band, now common across much of North America.
dove pigeon
Dusky Thrush
The Dusky Thrush is a boldly marked Siberian thrush with heavily scaled blackish-and-white underparts and a bright rufous wing patch, wintering across East Asia and occasionally reaching North America.
songbird