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.
Eurasian Wryneck
A cryptically patterned, bark-camouflaged relative of true woodpeckers that lacks their stiff tail and chisel bill, famous for twisting its neck in a slow, snake-like threat display.
woodpecker
Brown Fish Owl
A large brown fish-hunting owl of South and Southeast Asian waterways, streaked brown overall, with feathers and bare, bristly lower legs adapted for hunting at the water's edge.
owl
Wilson's Warbler
A small, bright yellow warbler with an active, flitting manner, males topped with a neat, glossy black cap and no wing bars or streaking anywhere.
songbird
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
Intermediate Egret
A medium-sized all-white egret of Asia, Africa, and Australia, best told apart from its larger and smaller relatives by bill proportions and the extent of bare skin around the eye.
wading bird
Brolga
Australia's iconic crane, grey overall with a bare red band of skin around the head and a distinctive fold of skin (dewlap) under the chin, well known for its elaborate dancing displays.
wading bird
Flammulated Owl
A tiny, highly secretive migratory owl of western pine forests, camouflaged to match bark with a fine mottled gray-and-rufous pattern, and unusual among small owls for its dark eyes.
owl
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
Hoatzin
An unusual, primitive-looking bird of Amazonian and Orinoco wetlands, with a spiky rufous crest, bright blue bare facial skin, and reddish eyes, known for chicks with clawed wings used to climb.
other
Bank Myna
A bluish-gray South Asian myna with warm brick-colored underparts and a distinctive patch of bare orange-red skin behind the eye, often found nesting in burrows along riverbanks.
songbird
Brown Creeper
A tree-trunk specialist whose mottled brown and buff feathers mimic bark texture perfectly, paired with stiff, pointed tail feathers that brace against trunks like a woodpecker's.
songbird
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
Pine Grosbeak
A large, tame northern finch with a stout bill, rosy-pink males and grey-and-yellow females, and bold white wing bars visible in flight.
songbird
Hutton's Vireo
Hutton's Vireo is a stocky, kinglet-like resident of Pacific coast evergreen woodlands, identified by its bold broken eyering and white wing bars.
songbird
Pigeon Guillemot
The North Pacific counterpart of the Black Guillemot, similarly sooty black with a white wing patch, but with the patch typically crossed by a dark wedge or bar.
seabird
Least Flycatcher
One of the smallest Empidonax flycatchers, notable for its bold white eye-ring and crisp wing bars against grayish-olive plumage.
songbird
Beavan's Bullfinch
A compact, orange-breasted bullfinch of Himalayan and Chinese mountain forests, easily told by its gray cap and bold pale wing bar.
songbird
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
Australian White Ibis
A common Australian ibis with white body plumage and a bare black head and neck, now a familiar sight scavenging in city parks and rubbish bins as well as its native wetland habitats.
wading bird
Yellow-throated Vireo
The Yellow-throated Vireo is a canopy-dwelling songbird with a vivid yellow throat and spectacles set against an olive-green back and clean white wing bars.
songbird
White-winged Crossbill
A boreal finch with a crossed bill like its relative the Red Crossbill, but immediately told apart by two bold white wing bars on black wings.
songbird
Eastern Wood-Pewee
A modestly plumaged woodland flycatcher known more for its plaintive whistled song than its subtle olive-gray coloring and faint wing bars.
songbird
Great Frigatebird
A large, soaring tropical seabird closely resembling the Magnificent Frigatebird, with glossy black males and females marked by a white breast patch and pale wing bar.
seabird
White-faced Ibis
A close relative of the Glossy Ibis found in the Americas, sharing similar rich chestnut plumage with an iridescent sheen, but distinguished in breeding adults by a thin band of white feathers bordering the bare red facial skin.
wading bird