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Bird Sizes

cwj2323 — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 20:11:10 GMT

I hope this is the correct spot to ask this.

I am new at trying to identify birds and I enjoy using the search here. Most often the birds I see are outside the window and I have a hard time guesstimating their size. Most often we get sparrows at our feeders. I would like to try and ID them all. Would you say they are Very Small or Small birds? Maybe this would help me some, if I can get the right size to start with. Also, what kind of birds would be considered small? The picture used for medium is a duck and this seems quite a jump from the smaller birds.

Thanks, Kim

Wing bars or Bill Color

cwren — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 04:48:59 GMT

Hi! I was recommended to your site last year and have been an avid whatbird user ever since. Just now started posting to the forums and put up some pics of birds you helped me greatly in ID'ing.

I did want to ask, though, as an amateur, I am learning the markings I need to look for, when trying to ID a bird. That narrows down my search alot, but the icons do not show (or maybe I need my eyes checked) very well, some of the more detail markings you can't see in a small icon. I have to go into each page, and, once opened, go "No, that's not it, It has one wing bar, I'm looking for two." or "No, bill color is wrong." I think the search time would be greatly reduced, and a correct ID made more easily, if users were able to add to the search request for one wing bar, or say a dark bill instead of yellow. Instead of having to look through say 20 birds or so, where ten don't have one wing bar and a dark bill. (Or maybe I'm searching wrong.)

I understand in juveniles this can change, but the search engine seems to rely mostly on adult markings, correct?

Is there a way, or is it a good idea, to have a functon, much as you have for head markings/patterns, where the areas searched must match and then a selection for white wing bars, such as a multiple choice between one, two or none? That would narrow my search down.

Also, some birds while having the same shape bill, have different colors. Can a bill color be added, to help in searching for an ID as well? i.e. yellow bill, top black/bottom yellow, pink bill, etc. with the check boxes like you do for shape. You do also mention legs and feet color, in the description, but since I am looking at their bill shape to begin with, I see their bill color as well and might not notice their legs or feet color before they fly off. The head is what I look at first. The sparrows I see all have cone shaped bills, but the coloring is different on many.

Again, I know juveniles might mess up the search, if I'm looking at one, so I don't know if those two ideas might fly. (Pardon the pun.)

I apologize if I my question is not clear. It is a late hour I am asking this.

Thanks for such a great site. It has enhanced my birding experience greatly and given me alot of info, also to help others, who know my new found interest, and they too, ask me "What bird?" and I say yes, go to their site, you'll find out!

Wishing you much sucess in the future.

Bird egg identification

safreund — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 15:29:11 GMT

I recently discovered two hatched eggs in my yard that are about the size of chicken eggs and are blue in color. They were on the ground - no nest and appeared to have tumbled from trees as my property is wooded. I live @ 1/8 mile from LI Sound on Long Island New York and my neighborhood is fairly rural. They are certainly too big to be backyard bird eggs - are they some type of waterfowl egg?

Best Kept Secrets

Mitchell Waite — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 03:47:51 GMT

Best kept secrets of the Search page (search)

Type any text in the search field and the bird names match list will shrink as you type. Thus if you know you saw a hummingbird you can type "hum" and the list will narrow to just the birds containing that text. (Note not all birds in a family contain the species name, so for example this quick way of finding hummingbirds does not include the Plain-capped Starthroat or the Green Violet-ear, both Hummingbirds.)
The match list can be sorted by Last Name, First Name on the Sort Menu. This way you can see all the birds of the same species in one nice list.
The match list can be sorted phylogenetically which means from an evolutionary order (this is called taxonomic on the Sort menu).

Welcome

Mitchell Waite — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 03:37:03 GMT

Use this forum to share ideas about the best use of the Whabird Search engine.