Body Sizes of North American Owls

Body Sizes of North American Owls

The 20 owl species in North America exhibit a great range in body sizes. While size itself is not the best diagnostic trait for identification, it is a useful characteristic to help dwindle the number of possible choices. This is especially useful considering that...
Ten Tips to Help Avoid Mis-Identifying Birds

Ten Tips to Help Avoid Mis-Identifying Birds

One of the frustrations that many novice birders run into is the tendency to mis-identify a lot of the birds they see, especially those birds which belong to the more difficult groups, such as the sparrows and flycatchers. This is not surprising since there can be,...

How to Begin Identifying Birds

Is bird identification a skill, an art or just good science? Well, in fact, it’s a combination of all three. For instance, it takes some skill to tell one species of warbler from another, whereas distinguishing between juvenile Empidonax flycatchers is an art...