Pictures of Birds

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Robin
Both European and American robins typically live close to human dwellings. The American robin eats mainly fruit, although it occasionally eats insects.






Snowy Owl
The snowy owl ranges across northern Eurasia and North America. During the winter months, the snowy owl’s white plumage camouflages it, allowing it to swoop down undetected on small mammals and fish.






Surf Scoter
The surf scoter, Melanitta perspicillata, is a migratory duck that spends its summers in Arctic tundra and muskeg regions of Canada and Alaska and its winters from southern California and the Gulf of California eastward to Florida. Surf scoters feed on insects, larvae, and pondweed.






Tropical Parrots
Florida’s warm, humid climate allows it to sustain exotic tropical wildlife like these parrots, originally from South America.










Vegetarian Finch
On visiting the Galápagos Islands in 1835, British naturalist Charles Darwin noted the diversity of life, with each island supporting its own form of tortoise, mockingbird, and finch, such as the vegetarian finch shown here. Darwin suspected that geographic isolation had caused a single species to gradually evolve into a number of diverse species. This theory of evolution by natural selection, as explained in his 1859 work On the Origin of Species, revolutionized understanding of the natural world.

Western Grebe
The graceful western grebe, Aechmophorus occidentalis, is well suited for life in water but cannot walk on dry land. The bird uses a variety of elaborate dances during courtship. The mating pair, shown here, race side-by-side across the water with their heads erect and their bodies pushed up out of the water.



White-Tailed Kite
The white-tailed kite, Elanus leucurus, lives in open country in the western United States south through Mexico into parts of Chile and Argentina. Like many members of the hawk family it hunts by soaring over open areas looking for field mice and other small mammals. Populations of this graceful long-winged kite are making a comeback after being hunted almost to extinction early in the 20th century.

Wood Duck
The wood duck, Aix sponsa, lives in a variety of freshwater habitats in Canada, the United States, and Mexico. It often swims in shallow water, foraging for the seeds of aquatic plants. Like other ducks, the wood duck has webbed toes that function as paddles.

Pictures of Birds

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Great Gray Owl
The great gray owl, Manitoba’s provincial bird, is one of many kinds of wildlife that live in the undeveloped forests of the province. Because its home is in the far north where it stays light much of the time, this owl must often hunt in daylight. Owls, which are generally nocturnal, prefer to hunt at night.







Great Kiskadee
Named for its loud kis-ka-dee call, the great kiskadee, Pitangus sulphuratus, inhabits open country from the southern United States to Argentina. Like other members of the flycatcher family, it feeds mainly on large insects that it catches in flight.








Green Heron
The green heron, Butorides virescens, is a small, solitary bird that lives among dense vegetation along the banks of ponds and marshes. It often sits in tall grass leaning motionless over the water watching for small fish to swim past. It strikes quickly at prey, seldom missing with its pointed bill.






Hawfinch
Native to Europe, Africa, and Asia, the shy hawfinch, Coccothraustes coccothraustes, is the largest member of the finch family. It is distinguished by its large, powerful bill, which it uses to crack open a variety of hard seeds. The bill changes from gray in winter to blue-black in spring.





White Egret
A great white egret flies with twigs for its nest. Egrets were nearly hunted into extinction for their feathers, which were used to decorate hats. Now they are protected by legislation.







Ivory-billed Woodpecker
John James Audubon’s Ivory-billed Woodpecker is from The Birds of North America, published between 1827 and 1838. Audubon was a perfectionist and went out into the field to collect specimens to work from in his studio. His work has the clarity and attention to detail that characterize high-quality scientific illustration, as well as the feeling for composition and line quality that characterize fine art.






Penguin
Penguins always return to their ancestral nesting sites to lay their eggs and rear their young. The emperor penguin, the largest of the penguins, lays its single egg during the coldest time of the Antarctic year, when temperatures drop as low as -62 degrees C (-80 degrees F). The egg is incubated on top of the parent’s feet, protected by abdominal folds of skin. Young chicks remain under these abdominal folds until they are able to regulate their own body temperature.





Purple Gallinule
The purple gallinule, Porphyrula martinica, ranges from South Carolina to South America. A powerful swimmer, the cootlike gallinule is less successful in flight. The bird spends most of its time hiding among the grasses of its marsh habitat. It forages on the muddy shores for small invertebrate animals and vegetation. Unlike other members of the rail family, the gallinule bill is too short to probe beneath the surface.



Red-Tailed Hawk
The red-tailed hawk, Buteo jamaicensis, is the most abundant hawk in North America. Although its plumage varies, all adults have a characteristic reddish-brown tail. It hunts by gliding over open countryside searching for rodents, insects, birds, and snakes.








Rhode Island Red
The Rhode Island Red, prolific year-round, is one of several American class breeds valued for the number and quality of its eggs.

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Pictures of Birds

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Common Snipe
The common American snipe is one of 81 species of sandpiper, which comprises the largest family of shorebirds. All sandpipers have relatively long wings and short tails, but differ greatly in the shape of their bills. The snipe can be found in swampy marshes and other wet habitats, where it uses its long, slender bill to probe for aquatic insects, snails, and small crustaceans.





Emu
The emu, Dromiceius novae-hollandiae, is a large, flightless bird native to Australia. Emus roam the western half of the continent in mass movements that may involve as many as 70,000 birds. They depend on the fruits, seeds, and flowers that grow in areas of recent rainfall and must migrate once they have depleted local sources. Frustrated farmers have constructed a 1000 km (600 mi) fence barring the emus from inland agriculture. Only when the males, which hatch and raise the young, are nesting are the giant birds tied to one location.


European Goldfinch
The European goldfinch, Carduelis carduelis, lives in open country where it feeds on the seeds of thistles and other weeds. Native to Europe and parts of Africa and Asia, this colorful songbird has been successfully introduced to Australia and South America. Its cheerful call is a repeated tswitt-witt-witt.






Feral Pigeon
Although pigeons are regarded as pests by many city dwellers, they are fairly unique in the bird world. They drink with their beaks underwater, actually sucking water through the nostrils. They are also the only bird besides the flamingo to produce a milklike crop secretion very similar in consistency and function to that of mammals. The feral pigeon is one of several breeds of rock pigeon, Columba livia. Although the bird pictured here hitched a ride from Liverpool, England, to Caracas, Venezuela, on a merchant ship, other members of its species typically migrate thousands of miles, maintaining speeds of up to 70 km/h (44 mph).

Flamingo
Colorful flamingos are found in lagoons and lakes in parts of the Galápagos Islands. Flamingos feed on microscopic life that they strain from the water and mud with their sievelike bills.









Franklin’s Gull
Not all gulls are seagulls. Also called prairie pigeon or prairie dove, the Franklin’s gull has adapted to life far from the ocean. It lives on the lakes and marshes of the Great Plains where it forages for insects, seeds, and fish. During the breeding season each mating pair builds a large floating nest out of cattails and other plants.





Godwit
Godwits live on the tidelands and prairies of Europe, Asia, and the Americas. These large, long-legged sandpipers may have been named for their ringing god-wit call. Godwits graze in shallow water by probing with their long pointed bills for insects, snails, and marine worms.





Golden Eagle
The golden eagle, found in northern North America, Europe, Asia, and North Africa, is one of thirty species of booted eagles, so named because of their completely feathered legs. The golden eagle has an involved aerial courtship display.







Goldeneye
The bright yellow eyes of this stocky duck contrast with its dark purple or green head. The female, shown here, has brownish-gray and white plumage. Goldeneyes are strong swimmers who can dive to depths of 6 m (20 ft) or more in search of food. They feed primarily on aquatic insects, crayfish, and plants.




Gouldian Finches
Gouldian finches are one of about 153 species of finches found worldwide. The bills of finches are structurally adapted for shelling seeds, their primary food. A seed wedged in a small groove on the side of the palate is crushed when the lower portion of the bill is raised up against it. The tongue then removes and discards the husk, after which the seed is swallowed.

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Pictures of Birds

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Bald Eagle
Designated as the national bird of the United States in 1782, the bald eagle is the second-largest bird of prey in North America, after the California condor. The bald eagle population has shrunk due to exposure to insecticides such as DDT and other toxins, but is now recovering in some areas.







Barred Plymouth Rock Hen
The barred Plymouth Rock hen is an American class chicken, categorized with other medium-sized, yellow-skinned fowl developed in the United States. Selectively bred from Asian, English, and Mediterranean stock, this species is valued for the quality of its meat.






Black Duck
The black duck, Anas rubripes, is a close relative of the mallard. It lives near bodies of freshwater throughout eastern North America. Black ducks are best adapted for life in wooded areas and have been hurt by the widespread clearing of forests within their range.







Black Turnstone
This plump sandpiper lives along the rocky coastlines of North America’s Pacific coast. The black turnstone, Arenaria melanocephala, feeds mostly on shellfish such as limpets and barnacles, and also on insects and seeds. It has a white belly that contrasts with its black head and back. During the winter its plumage changes from black to dark gray.





Burrowing Owl
The burrowing owl, Speotyto cunicularia, lives in the open grasslands and farmlands of eastern Canada and the United States. This brown and white owl hunts for small mammals, birds, and reptiles for most of the year, but switches to insects during the summer. Burrowing owls typically nest in burrows that have been abandoned by prairie dogs and other animals.





California Condor
The California condor, considered for years to be the most endangered species of bird in the United States, was removed from the wild in 1988 in an attempt to increase its numbers through captive breeding programs directed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.






Canada Goose
The Canada goose, Branta canadensis, is North America’s most common goose. Naturally migrating as far north as arctic Canada and as far south as central Mexico, it is gradually becoming a year-round resident in grassy suburbs throughout much of Canada and the United States. It grazes on the stems and shoots of grasses and can reach weights of 11 kg (24 lb).


Clapper Rail
The clapper rail, Rallus longirostris, found in salt marshes along the Atlantic Coast, grows to an adult size of 40 cm (16 in). It lays 6 to 15 white or buff-colored, spotted eggs in nests constructed out of grasses and reeds on the ground in meadows.






Common European Crane
The common European crane, a member of one of the oldest orders of birds, has evolved a number of complicated behaviors, called dances, which include the nestling’s excited bobbing on the return of its parents, the social dancing of adolescent birds, and the precopulatory dances of new mating pairs. Cranes will also dance spontaneously within a group or when agitated. The dances help curb aggression and form or strengthen relationships.




Common Rhea
The common rhea is the largest flightless bird in the western hemisphere. Ranging throughout the grasslands of South America south of the Amazon, the gregarious rheas feed on insects when young, but soon switch to an adult diet of vegetation. Rheas have long been hunted for their feathers, eggs, and meat.

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