Image: The Ultimate Bird Drawing Throwdown Showdown Graphic featuring images of David Sibley and H. Jon Benjamin

Join BirdNote tomorrow, November 30th!

Illustrator David Sibley and actor H. Jon Benjamin will face off in the bird illustration battle of the century during BirdNote's Year-end Celebration and Auction!

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Shows With Contributions by Conor Gearin

Artwork for episode 4 Bring Birds Back, featuring a photo of Isaiah Scott and an illustration of Tenijah Hamilton

Let’s All Go to Gullah Geechee Sea Islands with Isaiah Scott

This episode’s guest may be too young to remember the 90’s children’s show, Gullah Gullah Island, but he’s certainly influencing the next generation the same! Isaiah Scott, a rising Gen-Z bird-influencer and ornithologist, reconnects with Tenijah to dish all about his journey into birding…
Artwork for episode 3 Bring Birds Back, featuring a photo of Tony Suffredini and an illustration of Tenijah Hamilton

No Birds Were Harmed in the Making of this Podcast

Childhood nostalgia, anyone? Tenijah reminisces about her favorite bird moment in a film and learns all about how it came to be! Our guest this episode is Tony Suffredini, a bird trainer and master falconer, but the real stars are all Hollywood trained professionals – his birds! Tony…
Artwork for episode 2 Bring Birds Back, featuring a photo of Katie Umekubo, Susan Downey, Garry George and an illustration of Tenijah Hamilton

A.I. for Birds: A Lesson on Wind Farms

Artificial intelligence is all the rage these days – for better or for worse. Luckily, in the case of our feathered friends, it’s good news! In this episode, Tenijah speaks with three experts (starting with Garry George and Katie Umekubo) about the great environmental gains of wind energy…
Colorful illustration of prehistoric birds by artist Júlia d'Oliveira

Júlia d’Oliveira on Recreating Extinct Animals

Júlia d’Oliveira is a paleoartist who brings extinct species to life in artwork. For each species she illustrates, she learns everything she can about the species to come up with a realistic portrait. Júlia hopes her paleoart offers something different from the grotesque versions of…
Artwork for episode 1 Bring Birds Back, featuring a photo of Corina Newsome and an illustration of Tenijah Hamilton

The Zero Sum of it All with Corina Newsome

In the season four premiere, we’re joined by wildlife advocate, ornithologist and (social media star) birder, Corina Newsome! Tenijah speaks with Corina about the latest findings in the State of the Birds report, the impact of environmental racism on urban communities and birds, and the…
A Gray Catbird with soft light gray plumage and dark eye, its short sharp beak open as it calls

Birds that Sound Like Cats

Named after their distinctive cat-like “mew” call, Gray Catbirds are mimic thrushes, related to mockingbirds and thrashers. They can imitate a wide variety of noises, from songbirds to mammals to frogs. Noisy and boisterous in the spring, a migrating flock of catbirds can fill a city park…
A black hummingbird with iridescent blue throat and green breast

A Lost Hummingbird is Found Again

The Santa Marta Sabrewing is a hummingbird species so rare, they’ve only been documented twice in recent years. Native to the mountains of Colombia, they were officially described in 1946. No one reported another sighting until 2010. They became a “lost” species, eluding every attempt to…
A male Bobolink bird perches on plants in a golden grassy field

What’s a Field of Grass to a Bird?

Although a field of grass might not seem like valuable habitat at first, many birds have adapted to nest in grassland habitats and nowhere else. In North America, birds such as the Bobolink seek out grasslands to raise their young, deftly hiding their nests within the dense vegetation…
A large flightless bird displays glossy black plumage, bright blue neck and head, with large helmet or "casque" formed of bone atop its head

Raising the World’s Deadliest Bird

You might think the first bird species that humans raised in captivity would be a relatively small one, like a chicken. But evidence suggests that people in New Guinea reared the cassowary, often called the world’s deadliest bird, as much as 18,000 years ago, long before the domestication…
A slender black bird with very long tail strides across wet sand

Great-tailed Grackle

Great-tailed Grackles live up to their name. The glossy black males trail their long, V-shaped tails behind them as they fly, almost like a plane towing a banner ad. And while not quite as flashy, the brown-feathered females have impressively long tails, too. Also known as the Mexican…