Many birds that play do it alone by swinging, sliding, or rolling around. Some species interact with objects, like dropping a stone and picking it up again. But a select few birds – like these crows – play with other members of their species. Scientists call this social play. It appears to…

Puffins are icons of the seabird world. With clown-like faces and huge, multicolored bills, they stand upright on sea cliffs along the northern oceans. Tufted Puffins nest on islands and rough coastlines, from the Channel Islands of Southern California across the north Pacific to Siberia…

The habitats that comprise Sunkhaze Meadows Refuge in central Maine — including peat bogs, streamside meadows, shrub thickets, cedar swamps, and maple forests — are rich with bird life, like this Yellow-bellied Flycatcher. You’ll also find Bobolinks and more than 20 kinds of warblers…

The White-bearded Manakin lives in Trinidad and throughout much of South America. The males court females by snapping their wings with firecracker-like pops. A flurry of males flits rapidly back and forth from one slender, bare sapling to another, a foot above the ground. When the male…

The ringing notes of a Rock Wren’s song reverberate across a steep, rocky slope in the American West. The Rock Wren is most at home in piles of rock rubble at the foot of cliffs, a life zone known as a talus slope. These wrens find shelter, safe nesting, and a good supply of insects in the…

In southern New Jersey lies a region known as the Pine Barrens, home to many birds, including this Great Crested Flycatcher. With broad tracts of pine forest interspersed with grassland and shrubland, the Pine Barrens remain one of the largest expanses of green in the Northeast, supporting…

Each spring and summer, Indigo Buntings sing their buzzy, jumbled songs from brushy edges throughout the Eastern US. West of the Rockies, a different bunting sings his song. Named for the gemstone lapis lazuli, a male Lazuli Bunting shimmers an iridescent azure. He looks as if he might…

The raucous laughter of the Common Murre rings out from a nesting colony, high on a narrow ledge on a sea cliff. Precarious as their nest site is, Common Murres nest by the thousands along the Pacific Coast, perhaps millions north along the Bering Sea. Their eggs are pointed at one end and…

In parts of the United States, House Finches overlap with similar-looking Purple Finches. Their distinct songs help us sort them out. House Finch songs are jumbled and have a sharp, buzzy note — especially during the breeding season. Purple Finches’ songs, on the other hand, are smoother…

Meet three of the most fearsome predatory birds. The Northern Goshawk is a silver blur when it rockets toward an unsuspecting grouse. The Brown Snake-Eagle snatches six-foot cobras off the ground. And the Eurasian Eagle-Owl preys on animals as large as deer fawns.