Bird Behavior

A Common Myna stands on a railing with its beak open, vocalizing.
Sleepy Birds Are Lousy Singers, Study Finds
August 21, 2025 — Just like people, songbirds are groggy and quiet after a rough night’s sleep—a sign that urban noise and light may leave them less fit for reproduction and survival.
A gull walking on pavement holding a piece of green baked good in its beak.
This Researcher Wants Your Photos of ‘Gulls Eating Stuff’
July 21, 2025 — A community science project examines how gull diets are shifting amid population declines.
A female mallard is harnessed with a tracking device.
To Solve the Mallard's Mysterious Decline, Researchers Turn to Hi-Tech Trackers
June 20, 2025 — Biologists are using the devices to better understand the bird's behavior and, ultimately, what might be driving our most common duck's population drop.
A Vermilion Flycatcher splashes the surface of water with a fish in its beak.
‘Oh, Wow!’—Stunning Photos Offer First Known Proof of Vermilion Flycatchers Fishing
March 12, 2025 — An Arizona photographer’s images of Vermilion Flycatchers and Black Phoebes catching and eating fish—and one unlucky lizard—provide a rare glimpse into a little-known side of both birds.
The inside of a nest box containing a nest of sticks, four small eggs, and a snakeskin.
Some Birds Adorn Their Nests With Snakeskin to Scare Off Predators, New Study Finds
November 26, 2024 — Nests with shed skins have long fascinated ornithologists, but researchers only recently confirmed their use as a deterrent by cavity nesters.
Two Bald Eagles stand on a branch looking down at a juvenile hawk who is looking up at them with its mouth open.
A Teen Photographer Captured a Raptor Rarity: Bald Eagles Raising a Red-tailed Hawk Chick
September 03, 2024 — Fresh off a win in the Audubon Photography Awards, Parham Pourahmad shares how his fast-growing passion for photographing wildlife led him to document the unusual avian adoption.
Two hummingbirds on a small branch fighting with each other.
Why Do Hummingbirds Fight So Much?
August 21, 2024 — For hungry hummers in need of nectar to fuel their high-speed lives, territorial disputes can get ugly.
Woodcocks Don’t Let Migration Mess With Their Sex Lives
April 24, 2024 — A new study finds the first proof that timberdoodles mate as they migrate, an extremely rare behavior known as itinerant breeding.
A flock of birds flies across a red sky with a crescent-shaped sun.
A Total Solar Eclipse Is Coming. How Will Birds and Other Wildlife React?
March 15, 2024 — When the moon covers the sun, animals get weird. April’s eclipse gives scientists—and you—a chance to learn more about their responses. Here's how and where you can take part.
A Bald Eagle sits in a nest on the ground looking at the camera.
Why Do Birds Incubate Rocks?
March 14, 2024 — From stones to bones and other random objects, birds have been found to incubate seemingly anything that looks like an egg. But maybe that’s also the point?