The song of a Western Meadowlark rings out across the eastern slope of Washington’s Cascade Mountains. Come Memorial Day weekend, members of Audubon and friends will celebrate 50 years of gathering at the Wenas Campground to welcome the birds and wildflowers of spring. Two hundred and…

The crisp song of a cardinal . . . the goofy call of a Willow Ptarmigan . . . You can hear these recordings and 150,000 others when you log on to the Macaulay Library at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. The bird sounds you hear on BirdNote come from this library. Linda Macaulay, after whom…

In spring, raptors like this Ferruginous Hawk and hundreds of other bird species migrate north along the front range of the Rocky Mountains. Some songbirds, such as the Bullock’s Oriole, stop to nest along the Cache La Poudre River as it flows through Fort Collins, Colorado. On May 11…

Since 1995, biologist Dan Varland, Executive Director of Coastal Raptors, has been monitoring the health of raptors on the Washington coast, where Peregrine Falcons stoop on shorebirds feeding along the tideline. He’s looking for mercury and DDT in the birds’ blood systems. Though it has…

Don’t let the name fool you -- the Great Dismal Swamp is alive with birds! Particularly at this time of year, lucky visitors will find newly arrived Neotropical migrants. In conjunction with International Migratory Bird Day, the Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge will host its…

In January 2009, a US Airways flight completely lost power after striking a flock of Canada Geese. The captain was able to guide the crippled plane to an emergency landing in the Hudson River, and all passengers were safe. Protecting planes is a constant challenge. Wildlife biologist Steve…

The soft whistles of this Great Tit, a common European bird, can be hard to hear over city noises. So these birds now sing at a higher pitch and faster than normal. This song carries better over the traffic noise of the city. A bird singing at a higher range is better able to declare its…

Every March, Sandhill Cranes return to the Platte River in Nebraska, on their way to nesting grounds in coastal Alaska, northern Canada, and Siberia. Birdwatchers come from all over and contribute mightily to the state's economy - as much as $30 million per year. In addition to being of…

A male Montezuma Oropendola holds forth in a tree bedecked with twenty or more hanging nests. The nests are intricately woven sacks hanging three feet or more from the branches. Oropendolas favor trees that are separate from other trees and often build near large nests of wasps, whose…

At a display area, known as a lek, the male Greater Sage-Grouse perform for mating rights, while the smaller females look on. Today, the Greater Sage-Grouse is seriously endangered, its fate intertwined with the loss of sage habitat. Millions of acres have been converted to cropland, and…