Birding: What is It?
October 25th, 2022 by georgann
Unless you can identify birds by songs and call notes,
you must get at least a glimpse of most birds
to know what they are. Most novice birders need more than a glimpse.
So, what are you looking for?
BIRDS IN FLIGHT
Birds are often seen first as they are flying. Flight behavior is a good clue to the identity of many birds. If nothing else, you can eliminate what the bird isn’t, thereby narrowing it down. A straight flight is indicative of a great number of birds including Common Grackles, American Crows, Red-winged blackbirds, American Robins and Blue Jays. Grackles and blackbirds tend to fly in flocks especially in the winter. Crows are pretty easy, unless their wing tips open and curve up a little like a Pileated Woodpecker. Or its wings appear curved downward with a stiff beat like a Green Heron. Robins tend to flap a little irregularly. Blue Jays like to end a flight by raising their wings only up to their body and back down in a shortened stroke.
A bouncing or undulating flight is more typical of Carolina Chickadees, Tufted Titmice, and American Goldfinches. Similar sized warblers don’t bounce very much and just before they land on a branch they dart either to the right or left at the last second. Thrushes may do the same, but often have to settle their wings and tail immediately after landing as if readjusting them. Woodpeckers prefer to flap a few times and then hold their wings closed, alternating this dipping pattern as they fly along. Rumor has it that the timing of the dip is important if they are to land feet first on a tree trunk. Hawks soar as do vultures. But hawks fly flat and both Turkey and Black Vultures have more of a dihedral or “V” shape to their wing profile. If you watch closely, the Black Vulture flies a little flatter than the Turkey.
The necks of herons, egrets and bitterns are retracted s they fly, but ibises, cranes, Canada Geese and Wood Storks have outstretched necks.
Spending time watching even the most common birds flying will imprint these flight patterns in your mind so that you can identify birds at great distances. Your friends will be quite impressed that you can call out a bird as you drive 70 mph and, at the same time, keep the car on the road.
COLOR
Colors of birds are one of the first and easiest characteristics we teach to little children. Most familiar birds are easy to recognize because of their color; red for Northern Cardinals, blue for Blue Jays and bluebirds, black for crows, yellow/green for warblers, gray/green for flycatchers, white for egrets, and so on.
Many birds are similar in size and color, however. Special markings, called field marks, may be the only way to discern between two look-alike species. Field marks include crown stripes, eye lines, eye bars, eye rings, cheek patches, lores above the nostrils, throat streaking, breast spots, tail spots, wing bars, crissum color, and nape colors. By studying a good field guide’s topographic drawing of a bird (usually at the beginning of the book), you can learn what these marks are called. By studying the illustrations or photos in the field guide, you learn which field marks are important.
The color of a bird can be difficult to ascertain if it is flying. The sun and sky as a background do little for color saturation. Watch the bird until it flies in front of the tree canopy or just before it lands in leaves. Green leaves make a better background than the sky.
SIZE AND SHAPE
Next to color, a bird’s size and shape is most useful. Birds are divided into large groups called orders. The orders of birds are usually easily learned because they usually contain birds of similar size and shape. Because of this, the differences between orders of birds are very apparent. Even small children can tell orders of birds apart; i.e., hawks, ducks, shorebirds, hummingbirds, grouse, woodpeckers, songbirds.
Within orders, birds are divided into families. The differences in families within an order are more subtle; shapes of wings and tail and size of beak. While both are in the order Falconiformes, the differences in wing shape and tail length place a Cooper’s Hawk in the accipiter family and a Red-tailed Hawk in the buteo family. Postures, behaviors and internal structures that you cannot see are also used to place birds in different families.
Songbird families are often the most frustrating to learn. But upon close examination they begin to look as different as faces in a classroom of children. Looking through your field guide, you will see that many songbirds have distinctive beak and body sizes and shapes. Warblers, for example, are sleek small birds with thin beaks, while sparrows are stockier bodied and have thicker cone-shaped beaks. The Mimidae family of Northern Mockingbirds, Gray Catbirds and thrashers are long in body, beak and tail. Chickadees are small, round and tiny beaked. Thrushes are larger, plump, big headed and large eyed birds. Tanagers and orioles are medium sized with long straight beaks, but grosbeaks are chunkier and very thick beaked.
Crests are also important. Northern Cardinals, titmice, Cedar Waxwings, Blue Jays, and some flycatchers all have crests. Pileated Woodpeckers, Hooded Mergansers, kingfishers, herons and egrets have crests of feathers on top of their heads.
BEAKS AND TAILS
Whenever you study the size and shape of a bird, you will need to include the beak. A long thin straight beak will make a bird look longer and thinner, like thrashers. A cone shaped beak shortens the face, making the bird appear more round-headed, like sparrows and grosbeaks. Down curved beaks are typical of Brown Creepers, Northern Mockingbirds, thrashers, and wrens. They are also found in cuckoos and many shorebirds such as godwits, curlews, and whimbrels. Nearly anyone can recognize a duck by its flat beak. Anyone who has been bitten by a parakeet or parrot can identify hooked beaks, also found in birds of prey.
At the other end, a bird’s tail can be useful especially if it is flying. Long thin graduated tails are seen in cuckoos and Mourning Doves. Birds that are black with short tails are European Starlings; those with medium sized tails are either Red-winged, Brewer’s or Rusty Blackbirds. Very long tailed black birds are grackles. Short tailed songbirds are nuthatches. Swallows with their forked tails are distinguished from swifts that have hardly any tail. The ultimate examples of forked or notched tails are Scissor-tailed Flycatchers, terns, Barn Swallows and Swallow-tailed Kites. Among the birds of prey, the short fan-shaped tails of buteo hawks such as Broad-winged and Red-tailed, help tell them from accipiters and falcons that have longer thinner tails.
BEHAVIOR
Watching the behavior of a bird takes considerably more time than just a glimpse of its shape and color. But observing bird behaviors can be tremendously rewarding. On dark days or in poor lighting when color, field marks, beak and tail shapes and sizes are not clearly seen, the way a bird walks, perches, climbs a tree or moves its tail can identify it at least to its family. American Robins hop on the ground while European Starlings and grackles strut. Phoebes flip their tails while perched. Spotted Sandpipers pump their tails but Solitary Sandpipers teeter their entire body. Nuthatches crawl on tree trunks in all directions, but Brown Creepers only move in a spiraled up. A Hermit Thrush has helium in its tail; it rises continually. A merganser dives under water; a Mallard doesn’t. These are subtle behaviors but once noticed, can be useful even without using your binoculars.
If all this seems overwhelming, don’t despair. Given enough desire and time all of these clues become second nature. Each characteristic will be processed quickly by your brain and your fingers will glide smoothly through your field guide. Never again will you call someone for help and simply say that the bird was big and brown. Train your eyes to see colors, field marks, beak and tail shapes, and characteristic behaviors. Remember to watch the bird for as long as possible until you have memorized everything about it or until it has flown away.
Birding Adventures, Inc.
Georgann Schmalz
Ornithologist
www.birdingadventuresinc.com