Toronto migration: Learn to hear and track birds
It can be challenging to identify bird vocalizations. The best way to learn is to track down the birds that you are hearing. Grab your binoculars and try to see the mysterious songster. This sort of experience will help you remember the species next time you hear them.
You can also start off by learning a few common birds very well. Focusing on differences in pitch, pattern, and tone will help you learn to distinguish different species.
Source: Cornell Lab of Ornithology Macaulay Library
Photos from Star wire services
Its habit of investigating people and everything else in its home territory, and quickness to discover bird feeders, make it one of the first birds most people learn. Read more.
In the North, their early arrival and tumbling song are happy indications of the return of spring. Male Red-winged Blackbirds do everything they can to get noticed, sitting on high perches and belting out their conk-la-ree! song all day long. Females stay lower, skulking through vegetation for food and quietly weaving together their remarkable nests. Read more.
These are active and acrobatic little finches that cling to weeds and seed socks, and sometimes mill about in large numbers at feeders or on the ground beneath them. Read more.
Downy Woodpeckers hitch around tree limbs and trunks or drop into tall weeds to feed on galls, moving more acrobatically than larger woodpeckers. Their rising-and-falling flight style is distinctive of many woodpeckers. Read more.
Blue Jays are known for their intelligence and complex social systems with tight family bonds. Their fondness for acorns is credited with helping spread oak trees after the last glacial period. Read more.
Cardinals don’t migrate and they don’t molt into a dull plumage, so they’re still breathtaking in winter’s snowy backyards. In summer, their sweet whistles are one of the first sounds of the morning.
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