Grassland birds as a group have been hit especially hard, with a 53-percent reduction in their overall population — the greatest bird decline in any single terrestrial biome.… Read more >>

You’ve probably seen swallows darting back and forth on fluttering wings, plucking insects out of the air to eat. Swallows — members of the bird family Hirundinidae, which includes 86 species worldwide — are part of a broader category of birds called aerial insectivores, meaning they catch insects on the… Read more >>

I remember being in the outdoors often with my father when I was a boy. My Dad, Zene, was an avid hunter, angler, and unintentional naturalist, and we were in the fields or at the lake nearly daily. Zene was an Iowa farm boy who grew up to be a… Read more >>

With Valentine’s Day quickly approaching, do you know what you’re going to get the bird-loving object of your affection? Here at ABC, we have some suggestions for you to make this Valentine’s Day a bird-friendly one:  Red-necked Grebe pair. Photo by Dan Behm. If the number-one gift to give on… Read more >>

What is a grosbeak? The key to these birds’ identity is in the name. “Grosbeak” (pronounced GROSS-beak) comes from a French phrase that means “large bill,” and grosbeaks can all be recognized by the big, chunky bills they use to crack open and eat seeds. Male Pine Grosbeak in flight.… Read more >>

(Italicized words are in Chahta anumpa, Choctaw language, unless otherwise noted.) Halito, sv hochifoyvt Aimee. Chahta micha Chikashsha ohoyo sia. Hattak Api Homma Immi foka achonachi ka isht hachi ittimanompoli la chi. Hello, my name is Aimee. I am a Choctaw and Chickasaw woman, and I want to talk to… Read more >>

In the battle to save declining species, the shovel and greenhouse are a powerful sword and shield. Conservation is when you leave the natural world to its own devices, right? That may be what many people think. Yet as we face invasive species, climate change, and widespread habitat loss and… Read more >>

"ABC Birding" is a triannual feature of Bird Conservation magazine that takes readers to birding sites benefiting from ABC and partners' conservation efforts across the Western Hemisphere. Lay of the Land: The Buenaventura Reserve spans 9,947 acres of lower montane cloud forest in the southwestern Andes of Ecuador. This incredibly rich and… Read more >>

The ornithologist James Welty once said that “birds lead intense lives.” Perhaps no avian group embodies that phrase better than the hummingbirds. With wings beating so fast they’re a blur, these tiny birds fuel their super-high metabolisms with sugary flower nectar, then go into torpor to make it through the… Read more >>

Reconstructed skeleton of Archaeopteryx. Photo by Jim the Photographer from Springfield/Wikimedia Commons. All birds have wings. Even flightless birds, which are descended from flying ancestors, use their wings for balance, display, and other purposes. The origins of these extraordinary appendages date back to the time of dinosaurs, but the cause… Read more >>