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.
Goldcrest
Europe's smallest bird, identifiable even from a single tiny feather by its vivid black-bordered crown stripe — orange in males, yellow in females — set against olive-green plumage.
songbird
Wilson's Phalarope
A slim, needle-billed shorebird of prairie wetlands, Wilson's Phalarope shows a striking chestnut neck stripe in breeding plumage and plain gray-and-white feathers otherwise, unusual among birds for its reversed sexual dichromatism.
shorebird
Chimney Swift
A cigar-shaped aerial bird with uniformly sooty gray-brown plumage and stiff, spine-tipped tail feathers used to brace against vertical surfaces.
other
Common Kingfisher
A small, jewel-like bird whose brilliant structurally iridescent blue back feathers and warm orange underparts make it one of the most vividly colored birds along any river.
other
Eastern Bluebird
A small, vividly colored thrush whose blue feathers are produced by feather structure rather than pigment, giving them a shifting brightness depending on the angle of light.
songbird
Snail Kite
A marsh-dwelling raptor with a thin, deeply curved bill for extracting apple snails, and feathers ranging from slaty gray in males to warm streaked brown in females and young birds.
raptor
Smew
The Smew is a small, striking Eurasian merganser whose male appears almost entirely white, marked with a bold black eye patch and delicate black lines along the back and flanks.
waterfowl
Black-and-white Owl
A striking Neotropical wood owl patterned in crisp black-and-white barring, with no ear tufts and a bright yellow-orange facial disc and bill that contrast sharply with its otherwise monochrome plumage.
owl
California Condor
One of the largest flying birds in the world, with enormous black flight feathers and bold white underwing patches.
raptor
Crested Tit
The Crested Tit is a small European woodland bird easily recognized by its pointed, black-and-white speckled crest, a feature unique among the continent's tits.
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
Iceland Gull
A pale, gentle-faced gull of the North Atlantic Arctic, the Iceland Gull shows pale gray back feathers and white to very pale wingtips, smaller and more delicately built than the similar Glaucous Gull.
seabird
Eurasian Spoonbill
A tall, all-white wading bird with a distinctive spoon-shaped bill, recognized by its clean white plumage and, in breeding season, a shaggy nape crest and pale yellow breast band.
wading bird
Brown-headed Cowbird
A small blackbird best known for laying its eggs in other birds' nests, with males showing a sharply contrasting brown head against a glossy black body and females entirely plain gray-brown.
songbird
Black Swan
An Australian swan with distinctively curled, sooty black-gray body feathers and a striking red bill, its white flight feathers hidden until the wings are spread.
waterfowl
White Peafowl
A striking all-white color variant of the Indian Peafowl, retaining the species' iconic train shape and fanning display despite lacking the typical iridescent blue-green coloring.
gamebird
European Pied Flycatcher
A small Old World flycatcher in which breeding males show bold black-and-white plumage, while females and nonbreeding males are softer brownish-gray.
songbird
Red-billed Quelea
A small African weaver famous for forming the largest flocks of any wild bird, with breeding males sporting a bold black or white facial mask and a bright red bill.
songbird
Mute Swan
An enormous, entirely white waterbird whose large, gently curved feathers are unmistakable simply by their sheer size among freshwater birds.
waterfowl
Barnacle Goose
A small, sharply patterned goose with a bold black-and-white face and finely barred silver-gray flanks, breeding on Arctic cliffs and wintering on coastal grassland.
waterfowl
Wood Stork
A large white stork with sharply contrasting black flight feathers and tail, and a bare, dark gray-black head and neck rather than feathered skin.
wading bird
Caique
A small, boldly patterned Amazonian parrot with an orange-yellow head, white belly, and green wings.
parrot
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
White-naped Crane
An East Asian crane with grey body plumage, a bold white stripe running down the nape and hindneck, and extensive bare red facial skin.
wading bird