Are you ready for this thing? I don't think you're ready for this thing.
Thanks to an undercover Audubon sting, this bird is more of a backyard staple than a celebrity.
Nightjars, goatsuckers, whatever you want to call them—these freaky birds are heard but rarely seen.
The Cattle Egret: The Opportunist Southern folklore depicts Brer Rabbit as the quintessential easy-going trickster, who uses his wits rather...
The Loggerhead Shrike: Looks Can Be Deceiving At first glance, you could be forgiven for thinking that that grey-and-white bird sitting on a...
The House Wren: The Unjustly Accused In the early 1900s, when Althea Sherman began noticing House Wrens nesting in her backyard in Iowa, she...
The Barred Owl: The Interrogator This first time I saw a wild Barred Owl I thought it was going to kill me. Bushwacking alone through a nameless...
The American Coot: A Tough-Love Parent A couple years ago, just after my daughter was born, my friend gave me a book called Parenting for...
The Southern Giant Petrel: Ogre of the High Seas The Procellariiformes have always seemed to me one of the more distinguished orders of birds...
Northern Harrier: The Gray Ghost Across North America, from the Arctic Tundra to the grasslands south of the border, if you look in the right...
The Lammergeier: Public Enemy No. 1 High in the Pyrenees Mountains lies a boneyard filled with half-devoured skeletons. The keepers of this...
The Hoatzin: Misfit, Belcher, Genetic Mystery Deep in the wilderness lurks a fat, foul beast that stinks of manure, barks and caws in gutteral...
The Kakapo: A Survivor There are few places on earth that could provide hospitable habitat for a nocturnal, flightless parrot that weighs nine...
Wilson's Phalarope: The Rebel Wilson’s Phalaropes don’t care for your gender norms. In the bird world, roles for the sexes are fairly...
The Oilbird: Is This Thing Even a Bird? You know the type: They go out after sundown and return again in the morning, and regurgitate whatever...
This pudgy little bird may not look like anything special, but beneath its underwhelming exterior beats the heart of a champion.
The Bar-tailed Godwit: A Marathoner Who Makes It Look Easy You probably already know the amazing story of the Bar-tailed Godwit—who...
The Galapagos Penguin: The Beach Bum Think of a penguin. What do you see? Allow me to hazard a guess: You see a cathedral of snow and ice, and...
The Black Skimmer: A Scissor-beaked Night Hunter Bear with me for a brief thought experiment: What if humans had to eat the same way Black...
Wilson's Storm-Petrel: The Water Walker What’s the most ubiquitous bird you can think of? Even the least outdoorsy of us have crossed paths...
The Superb Lyrebird: An Artist With Commercial Appeal It's safe to say that no bird on earth can rival the viral potency of the Superb...
The House Sparrow: Little Troopers There’s an army in the bushes. You may not have noticed, but there’s a good chance it's nearby...
The Monk Parakeet: A Jailbird Who Made Good There's a legend that holds that Monk Parakeets became established in the United States after...
The Hoopoe: Emissary of Kings, Secreter of Stink It takes a special bird to incur the wrath of a legendary king. “I will punish him most...
