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.
Southern Boobook
Australia's most familiar and widespread owl, named for its distinctive 'boo-book' call, with dark brown feathers boldly spotted white above and streaked buff below.
owl
Short-toed Snake Eagle
The Short-toed Snake Eagle is a pale-bellied Eurasian eagle with brown upperparts, a mottled brown breast, finely barred flight and tail feathers, and a large owl-like head adapted for scanning the ground for reptile prey.
raptor
Vesper Sparrow
A streaky grassland sparrow best identified by white outer tail feathers and a small chestnut shoulder patch.
songbird
Hooded Vulture
A small, slender African vulture with plain dark brown plumage and a distinctive whitish downy hood of feathers on the head and neck.
raptor
Chihuahuan Raven
A desert raven of the American Southwest, smaller than the Common Raven, with hidden white feather bases at the neck.
corvid
Temminck's Stint
A small, plain-plumaged stint that favors quiet freshwater edges over open mudflats, distinguished from its rufous relatives by generally duller upperpart feathers and distinctive white outer tail feathers.
shorebird
Blue-throated Macaw
A large blue-and-yellow macaw with a distinctive patch of blue feathers on the throat, native to a small area of seasonally flooded savanna in Bolivia.
parrot
Scaled Dove
A small South American dove whose breast and neck feathers carry dark, crescent-shaped edges that overlap like fish scales.
dove pigeon
Meadow Pipit
The Meadow Pipit is a small, streaky brown songbird of open country, its cryptic, heavily streaked feathers providing camouflage against grass and heather.
songbird
Chipping Sparrow
The Chipping Sparrow is a small, neat sparrow recognized in breeding plumage by its bright rufous crown feathers over a clean, unstreaked gray breast.
songbird
Garganey
A small, strongly migratory Eurasian dabbling duck; breeding males show a bold white eyebrow stripe and long, drooping striped scapular feathers, while females resemble other small brown teal.
waterfowl
Nanday Conure
A green South American conure easily told by its solid black head, or hood, along with a small blue patch on the breast and red-feathered thighs.
parrot
Lined Forest Falcon
A small, shy Amazonian forest-falcon closely resembling the Barred Forest Falcon but with much finer, more closely-spaced barring on its underside feathers.
raptor
Lesser Rhea
A smaller relative of the Greater Rhea found in Patagonia and the high Andes, with soft mottled brown plumage flecked with pale feather tips that give it a speckled appearance.
other
Booted Racket-tail
A tiny Andean hummingbird best known for its puffy white leg feathers and, in males, a pair of long bare tail shafts ending in small dark paddle-shaped tips.
hummingbird
Military Macaw
A green macaw with a small red forehead patch and blue-edged wing and tail feathers, found in foothill forests and canyon country from Mexico to South America.
parrot
Green Bee-eater
A small, brilliantly green bee-eater found from Africa to South Asia, with a thin black eye stripe and a fine pin-like extension to its central tail feathers.
other
Blue-and-yellow Macaw
A large, brilliantly two-toned macaw with deep blue upperparts and golden-yellow underparts, a green forehead patch, and bare white facial skin crossed by narrow lines of small feathers.
parrot
Pine Siskin
The Pine Siskin is a small, heavily streaked finch whose brown feathers show flashes of yellow in the wings and tail, and whose winter range shifts unpredictably year to year.
songbird
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
Bluethroat
The Bluethroat is a small, ground-dwelling songbird whose breeding males display a strikingly iridescent blue-and-chestnut throat patch, set off by warm rufous tail feathers.
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
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
Jungle Myna
A slate-gray South Asian myna distinguished by a small tuft of feathers at the base of the bill, along with the bold white wing patch shared with related mynas.
songbird