38 birds containing the letter C — each with origin, classification, and notes.
Below are birds that contain the letter C anywhere in the name. Each of the 38 birds below opens to a full profile.
Britain's most elegant wader — a black-and-white bird with an extraordinary upturned bill that it swings from side to side through shallow water to catch invertebrates; the symbol of the RSPB, the avocet returned to breed in Suffolk in 1947 after an absence of over 100 years and is now one of British conservation's greatest success stories.
A small yellow finch native to the Canary Islands — domesticated for centuries as a singing pet, used historically in coal mines as gas detectors, and now bred in dozens of color and song varieties.
A vivid red songbird of the eastern and central United States, the official bird of seven U.S. states, with a distinctive crest and a year-round musical presence.
Britain's second most common bird and one of Europe's most abundant — the male in spring is a strikingly handsome bird with a pink-red breast, slate-blue head, and bold white wing bars; males sing a loud, rattling song ending in a distinctive flourish that varies in dialect between regions.
A small, fearless North American songbird with distinctive black cap and bib — beloved feeder birds known for sophisticated alarm calls that encode information about predator size and danger level.
The most numerous bird on Earth — over 30 billion at any given time — domesticated from the Southeast Asian red junglefowl about 8,000 years ago and now central to every poultry-eating cuisine on Earth.
A loud, intelligent Australasian parrot with a distinctive crest of feathers — including the most affectionate parrot species and some of the most ecologically destructive flocks, with several species critically endangered.
Two massive vulture species — the California condor (rescued from near-extinction in 1987 with only 27 birds remaining) and the Andean condor (the world's largest flying bird by combined wingspan and weight).
A diving water bird with non-waterproof feathers — visible drying with spread wings on rocks and pilings, used for centuries by Asian fishermen as living fishing tools, and now ecologically critical fish-eaters across coastal and inland waters worldwide.
The largest British bunting — a large, streaky, plain-brown bird of arable fields with no distinctive markings but an utterly unmistakable song, often described as jangling keys; the corn bunting has declined severely across Britain as intensive farming reduced the cereal stubble, rough grassland, and insect-rich field margins on which it depends; polygamous males may mate with up to 18 females in a season.
A tall, long-legged wading bird famous for elaborate courtship dances, lifelong pair bonds, and distinctive trumpeting calls — 15 species worldwide, with several critically endangered and others recovered through dedicated conservation.
A finch with a uniquely crossed bill — the upper and lower mandibles overlap like a pair of scissors, allowing it to prise open pine and spruce cones and extract the seeds inside with precision; crossbills can breed in the depths of winter when cones are ripe, sometimes nesting in snow.
A large, all-black corvid widespread across North America — among the most intelligent of all birds, with sophisticated tool use, problem-solving, and individual face recognition.
A medium-sized bird famous for its distinctive call (the basis of cuckoo clocks) and brood parasitism — laying eggs in other species' nests to be raised by unwitting foster parents.
Europe's largest wading bird — recognised by its extraordinarily long, downcurved bill and haunting bubbling call; a moorland and coastal bird facing serious population decline across its range due to habitat loss and predation of ground nests.
The most widespread and recognizable duck species on Earth, ancestor of nearly all domestic duck breeds, and a study in iridescent green and chestnut sexual dimorphism.
A swift, sharp-winged raptor — including the peregrine, the fastest animal on Earth — with extraordinary diving speeds and a long history as a hunting partner in royal falconry traditions.
A small, seed-eating songbird with a thick conical beak — including the Galapagos finches that helped Darwin develop natural selection theory, the canaries of pet history, and many beloved garden visitors.
The more brilliant cousin of the goldcrest — the firecrest matches the goldcrest in size (one of Europe's smallest birds) but is more vividly marked; the male has a brilliant orange-red crest stripe flanked by black, white supercilium, and bronze patches on the sides of the neck giving a jewelled appearance; a scarce but increasing breeder in Britain, mainly in spruce woodland in southern England.
Britain's smallest bird — the goldcrest weighs as little as a 10-pence coin, and at 4–7 g is the joint-smallest bird in Europe alongside the firecrest; a tiny olive-green bird with a bright stripe on the crown — yellow in females, orange-red in males, displayed when excited; common in coniferous woodland and one of the most abundant British birds despite suffering severe losses in cold winters.
A brilliantly coloured small finch with a crimson face, black and white head, and gleaming yellow wingbars — a specialist seed-eater that uses its narrow bill to extract seeds from thistles and teasels; one of Britain's most beloved garden birds.
Britain's most powerful-billed finch — the hawfinch has a massive, pale bill capable of cracking cherry stones and olive pits that require 50–70 kg of force to split; a bulky, short-tailed finch with rich chestnut, black, and white plumage and a distinctive white wing bar; notoriously shy and elusive, spending most of its time in high tree canopy and often detected only by its sharp call.
A tropical wading bird with extraordinarily long toes that distribute its weight across floating vegetation — earning it the nickname "lily-trotter" for its ability to walk on water lilies.
A small, ground-foraging sparrow nicknamed the "snowbird," common in winter across North America with regional color forms so different they were once classified as separate species.
A large, brilliantly colored Central and South American parrot with a powerful nutcracking bill and lifelong pair bonds, threatened across most of its range by habitat loss and poaching.
A medium-sized gray songbird famous for mimicking dozens of other species — capable of imitating 200+ songs and sounds across a lifetime, with the northern mockingbird as Harper Lee's literary symbol of innocence.
A small, compact woodland bird that walks headfirst down tree trunks — the only bird capable of descending a vertical surface face-down, and a remarkably efficient hoarder of seeds and insects.
The world's largest living bird — flightless, two-toed, capable of running at 70 km/h, laying the largest eggs of any bird, and producing meat increasingly farmed across the globe.
A boldly pied coastal wader with a long, bright orange bill used as a hammer and lever to open bivalves — conspicuous, loud, and one of the most recognisable shorebirds of rocky coastlines worldwide.
A large pheasant native to South Asia whose male sports a vivid iridescent train and elaborate fan display, the textbook example of sexual selection in evolution.
A large coastal water bird with a distinctive throat pouch — used as a fishing net during plunge-dives and as a holding bag while feeding chicks, common at coastal fishing piers worldwide.
The black-and-white summer visitor of ancient oak woods — the male pied flycatcher is crisply black above and white below with a bold white forehead patch; the female is brown and white; they arrive from West Africa in late April to breed in old oak trees and nest boxes, making sallying flights to catch insects and raising a brood before departing in late summer.
A compact, upright chat of heathland and coastal scrub — the male has a striking black head, white collar, and bright orange breast, and sits prominently on gorse or bramble stems making a harsh "wheet-tsak-tsak" call like two pebbles being knocked together; year-round resident on British heathland, it is one of the first birds to establish territories in January.
The largest toucan species, a Central and South American fruit-eater with a striking oversized orange bill that serves as a thermal radiator as well as a feeding tool.
A tiny, mouse-like bird that spirals methodically up tree trunks probing crevices for insects with its long, curved bill — always ascending, never descending, flying to the base of a new tree to start over; its brown and white bark-pattern plumage makes it nearly invisible on oak and ash bark.
The forest phantom of the twilight — the woodcock is almost never seen by day, relying on extraordinary cryptic plumage of dead-leaf brown, chestnut, and black bars to become invisible on the woodland floor; it emerges at dawn and dusk to probe soft ground for earthworms with its long, sensitive bill; males perform a distinctive display flight called roding over woodland in the breeding season.
A large, crow-sized woodpecker with a vivid red crest, the model for Woody Woodpecker; chisels rectangular holes deep into wood with a series of head-snapping impacts.
A small, social, vivid Australian songbird with zebra-striped tail feathers and orange cheek patches — a popular cage bird worldwide and the most-studied songbird in neuroscience laboratories.
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