All in Bird Watching
Wood ducks are our most colorful native duck species – and they are very beautiful indeed. Male wood ducks, in particular, are truly unforgettable. They have hints of iridescent green and brown on their head, along with bold black and white markings.
Most birds are great insect hunters. Robins, woodpeckers, barn swallows – there are plenty of birds that hunt insects. One of the most secretive bug hunters, however, is the brown creeper (Certhia Americana).
The red-bellied woodpecker is a medium-sized woodpecker that lives year-round in most of the eastern United States. Since it has bright red plumage on the back of its head, it is often confused with the red-headed woodpecker.
There is a very tiny bird that migrates through much of the United States at this time of year that goes unnoticed by most people. It is larger than a hummingbird, but not by much. A normal house sparrow is almost twice as big as this bird. It is only 3 to 4 inches long and weighs less than a third of an ounce! So what is it? It is the small but very energetic Golden-Crowned Kinglet.
Sandhill cranes are some of the tallest birds in North America. They stand a full four feet tall and have an impressive wingspan of more than seven feet. Some individual examples have a light tan hue to their feathers, but most are a dull gray.
Have you ever seen a pied-billed grebe? Maybe a better question is: Have you ever heard of a pied-billed grebe? These relatively small aquatic birds are common throughout North America, but unless you spend some time around lakes, ponds and wetland marshes you might never see one.
If you spend much time along lakes and waterways during the warm-weather months, you will likely see one of my favorite birds: the belted kingfisher. These birds are slightly larger than a robin, and they are an interesting blue-gray color above with a white belly and a white ring around their neck.
Everyone who has spent any amount of time outside has seen or heard a woodpecker at one time or another. Several species live in the eastern half of the United States, including red-headed woodpeckers, red-bellied, downy, hairy, pileated and yellow-bellied sapsuckers.
Orlando, Florida. It's the world's number one tourist destination. Most of the visitors come to see Disney World, Universal Studios, Sea World. Theme parks. Artificial attractions. We have better places here, natural attractions. One of them is the Tosohatchee Wildlife Management Area.
Mallard ducks are a very common, medium-sized waterfowl species living throughout North America. In fact, they are the most abundant duck species on the continent. They are actually common in other parts of the world, too, such as Europe, Asia, Australia and North Africa.
Sparrows tend to be hard for most casual birders to identify. Many of them just look like small, unremarkable brown birds. There are a few exceptions, though, and the white-crowned sparrow is one of them.
he barred owl is one of the silent night hunters of the Midwest and eastern United States. They are expanding their range out west, too. Their specialized feathers allow them to fly in almost complete silence, remaining undetected by their prey until it is too late.
