Identifying a Bird in Flight

One of the most difficult skills to pick up as a birdwatcher is how to identify birds in flight. You have to sort through a series of visual clues all at once, at high speed: silhouette, wing shape, how fast it flaps, and patterning. An experienced birder will take in all these and other clues that are hard to put into words — and might say something like: “Look! A hawk! Must be a Cooper’s Hawk — it has that giss.” In other words, it has all the telltale signs. But where did this bit of birdwatching slang originate? More info and transcript at BirdNote.org . Want more BirdNote? Subscribe to our weekly newsletter. Sign up for BirdNote+ to get ad-free listening and other perks. BirdNote is a nonprofit. Your tax-deductible gift makes these shows possible. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.