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!

RESERVE YOUR SPOT

Shows With Contributions by Mark Bramhill

A graphic with the Bring Birds Back artwork on the right side, a headshot of Caroline Brewer in the top-left corner, and a photo of Steve Hampton in the bottom-left corner.

What's in a Name?

Names have power. In North America, more than 100 species of birds have eponymous names, many honoring white colonizers. The “Bird Names for Birds” movement to change these names, or “verbal statues,” can be traced to Ph.D candidate Robert Driver’s 2018 proposal about the Thick-billed…
A graphic with the Bring Birds Back artwork on the right side, a headshot of Julia Wang in the top-left corner, and a photo of Tenijah Hamilton looking through binoculars in the bottom-left corner.

Lights Out

Migratory birds use starlight to find their way on their long journeys — which makes light pollution a serious threat. Drawn off course by bright, artificial lighting, birds can wind up fatally colliding with windows or wasting precious time and energy that they need to survive. “Lights…
A graphic with the Bring Birds Back artwork on the right side, a headshot of Conor Gearin in the top-left corner, and a photo of Tenijah Hamilton looking through binoculars in the bottom-left corner.

The Bird Journey Continues!

Tenijah got hooked on birding at the start of the pandemic, and during the last season of Bring Birds Back she learned a lot about our feathered friends. This season, she’s ready to learn and share more simple ways to help birds — while discovering new birding skills from experts. After…
Two sparrow chicks peeping over the edge of a nest built in an outdoor ashtray. A couple pieces of old cigarette pieces are at the edge of the nest.

Bird Facts Stranger Than Fiction

Novelist Kira Jane Buxton has written several books about a pet crow navigating a post-apocalyptic world. But her writing is full of real-world bird behaviors. She has taken inspiration from how sparrows line their nests with cigarette stubs — which can deter mites — and many other bits of…
A Field Sparrow faces the viewer, head turned to its right, showing its pale beige front, brown wing edge, grey stripe across its forehead, pink beak and legs.

Ada Limón: The Hurting Kind

Poet Ada Limón often writes about birds, and her new book, The Hurting Kind, is no exception. Birds are a throughline in the book — between the seasons, from childhood to present, and knowing and unknowing. Two of her poems examine opposite sides of the “knowing/unknowing” coin. You can…
An illustration of Bring Birds Back host Tenijah Hamilton, smiling and holding binoculars in a city park setting, as birds fly over her.

Season Two Trailer

Last year, Tenijah Hamilton discovered her love of birds – and found out that birds are in trouble. On a mission to help bring birds back, Tenijah joined bird enthusiasts from different backgrounds, identities, and communities to learn and share simple, everyday actions people can take to…
Female Common Merganser swimming with a couple of her chicks on her back, the rest swimming along behind her. The scene is sunlit and greenery reflects on the water.

Joyce Clement: Birds Punctuate the Days

Poet Joyce Clement writes haiku, a traditional Japanese form. While it's often thought of as having three lines with 5-7-5 syllables, Joyce says that the key elements of any haiku are a fragment and a phrase spoken in a single breath. In this sequence of haiku, Joyce juxtaposes punctuation…
Close up view of Atlantic Puffin in profile, its round head with white face and black cap, and colorful large broad short beak in bands of black, yellow, and orange, holding a flower by its stem.

Puffin Bills Glow

Puffins are known for their flashy bills, striped like a giant piece of candy-corn. New research has found that the bills of Atlantic Puffins glow brightly under ultraviolet blacklights. Neon, curved streaks appeared between the different colored segments of a puffin’s bill in this…
A sunlit Rose-breasted Grosbeak showing its black head and back, with white breast topped with red patch.

I Dream of Grosbeaks

Science educator Chidi Paige was working hard preparing her students for the World Series of Birding. Chidi’s students were studying with the goal of identifying the most birds in the kid’s competition. And then something happened that made Chidi wonder if they were thinking about birds a…
Bright red male Northern Cardinal, with his black mask and red beak, stands on a green grassy area.

Ada Limón and the Birds of Kentucky

When poet Ada Limón moved to Kentucky with her husband for his work, she was having trouble adjusting to her new home. To connect with the place, she began learning about the local birds and plants. She found comfort in the idea of the nearly omnipresent state bird, the Northern Cardinal…