In this issue, we celebrate the ABA Bird of the Year: the Belted Kingfisher. Liz Clayton Fuller talks about how she painted the Queenkiller, Katie Boord delves into the genus Megaceryle, you can give the Word Search a try, and more. Outside of the Bird of the Year, stories of Montezuma Quails, the Hen of Peru, and other birds abound.
This issue features the ABA Checklist Committee's annual report, the annual Check-list Redux, details on the US's first Bat Falcon, and an article on whether Western Flycatcher should be re-lumped.
Podcast ➚
We have reached the end of the first month of 2023 and it is once again time for This Month in Birding on The American Birding Podcast. For this panel we welcome a fascinating group of birders to geek out a little about birds. Martha Harbison, Dexter Patterson, and Jordan Rutter read more >>
Rarities continuing into the last week of January in the ABA Area include the Common Shelduck (ABA Code 5) in Pennsylvania, the Caribbean trio of La Sagra's Flycatcher (4), Bahama Mockingbird (4), and Red-legged Honeycreeper (5) in Florida, and the Red-flanked Bluetail (4) in southern California, This year has been a read more >>
ABA Travel
When you travel with the ABA, you help build a better future for birds and birding. The ABA offers a carefully designed program of birding travel experiences that not only let experience and thrill of seeing great birds and traveling with friendly, interesting people, they give you the satisfaction of knowing that you are supporting local on-the-ground conservation efforts as well as the ABA’s ongoing work to inspire all people to enjoy and protect wild birds.
Below is a sample of what we’ve got going. Click here to view all of our tours >>
Current ➚
Closer to Owls, but in the Right Ways.
Snowy Owls are one of the most recognized and beloved birds in the world. To protect them, it’s essential that birders enjoy these birds ethically.
Even when everything goes smoothly, airport layovers are an “exercise” in sedentariness. Which isn’t to say birdlessness. On the contrary, airport layovers sometimes result in life birds; that’s happened to me more than once. For those of us on eBird consecutive days streaks, airport layovers . . .
There are at least two features that often distinguish between skilled, experienced birders and others when it comes to large flocks of birds. The first is the understanding that just because many or most of the individuals of a large flock of birds appear to be referable to the same species does not necessarily mean that such an assumption is true for the entire flock.
by BILL PRANTY Bayonet Point, Florida On p. 72 of the Dec. 2022 issue of Birding, there appears a photograph, taken by Reinhard Geisler, of five terns standing or floating in shallow water at Stump Pass Beach State Park, Florida, on May 22, 2022. This photograph is a teaser read more >>
When I first hefted Bird: Exploring the Winged World, all 11 square inches and six pounds of it, I deemed it a coffee table book and braced myself for the kind of tome that is gorgeously illustrated but whose covers are rarely cracked. I was wrong. Bird is many things...
Like any great story, the scene is set early in the book. Marina Richie first spots the pair of Belted Kingfishers she grows to love while im-mersing the reader in her experience at Rattlesnake Creek in Missoula, Montana. “To visualize the watershed,” she writes, “cup two hands together. Rattlesnake Creek...
It’s all over. Migration. It came and went. Why does it always happen so fast? Why didn’t I go birding more during that precious window? How long until shorebirds start passing through again? No, no, no. Not only is it true that migration may not even be over in your...
The 2022 mid-year update of the ABA Checklist has been posted. It adds 5 new species:
Bat Falcon, Red-Masked Parakeet, Lilac-crowned Parrot, Rufous-tailed Rock-Thrush, Chihuahuan Meadowlark.
When I first hefted Bird: Exploring the Winged World, all 11 square inches and six pounds of it, I deemed it a coffee table book and braced myself for the kind of tome that is gorgeously illustrated but whose covers are rarely cracked. I was wrong. Bird is many things...
The 2022 mid-year update of the ABA Checklist has been posted. It adds 5 new species:
Bat Falcon, Red-Masked Parakeet, Lilac-crowned Parrot, Rufous-tailed Rock-Thrush, Chihuahuan Meadowlark.
Current ➚
Closer to Owls, but in the Right Ways.
Snowy Owls are one of the most recognized and beloved birds in the world. To protect them, it’s essential that birders enjoy these birds ethically.