Species of Virginia

Question 1

What is the common name of this bird?

Answer 1

Herring Gull

Question 2

What is the common name of the bird matching this description?

23-26” (58-66 cm). Adult has white spots in black wingtips, pale eyes, pink legs. Rather heavy bill is yellow with red spot. Head of adult is white in spring and summer, heavily streaked gray-brown in winter. Immature all dark brown with blackish bill at first. Reaches adult plumage in fourth winter.

Answer 2

Herring Gull

Question 3

What bird makes these keyer calls?

Answer 3

Herring Gull

Question 4

What bird produces these laugh-like outbursts?

Answer 4

Herring Gull

Question 5

What bird makes these whining calls?

Answer 5

Herring Gull

Question 6

What bird makes this Gagaga alarm call?

Answer 6

Herring Gull

Question 7

What bird excretes fecal matter that could be described as smelling like a dead seal?

Answer 7

Herring Gull

Question 8

What animals feel feathery to the touch?

Answer 8

Herring Gull, Black Tern, Northern Gannet, Black Skimmer, Black Vulture, Turkey Vulture, Red-shouldered Hawk, Red-tailed Hawk, Sharp-shinned Hawk, …

Question 9

What birds have a chicken and/or fishy taste, potentially with an oily or gritty texture?

Answer 9

Herring Gull, …

Question 10

What bird has an omnivorous diet that consists of fish, crustaceans, mollusks, sea urchins, marine worms, birds, eggs, insects, refuse, and carrion?

Answer 10

Herring Gull

Question 11

What bird looks like this during the breeding season?

Answer 11

Black Tern

Question 12

What bird looks like this outside of the breeding season?

Answer 12

Black Tern

Question 13

What is the common name of the bird matching this description?

10” (25 cm). W. 24 (61 cm). Summer adult has head and body mostly black, wings and tail silvery gray. Immatures and winter adults less distinctive, mostly white below, but still darker on back than other small terns, with dark mark at shoulder. Adults molting out of breeding plumage in late summer look patchy black and white.

Answer 13

Black Tern

Question 14

What bird makes this kicking call?

Answer 14

Black Tern

Question 15

What birds have a smell that is currently unknown to JMK?

Answer 15

Black Tern, Black Skimmer, Red-shouldered Hawk, Red-tailed Hawk, Sharp-shinned Hawk, …

Question 16

What birds have a taste that is currently unknown to JMK?

Answer 16

Black Tern, Black Skimmer, Red-shouldered Hawk, Red-tailed Hawk, Sharp-shinned Hawk, …

Question 17

What bird’s diet meets this description?

Mostly insects, fish. Diet on breeding grounds is mostly insects, also small fish, tadpoles, frogs, spiders, earthworms, crustaceans, leeches. In migration and winter at sea, eats mostly small fish, also some crustaceans and insects.

Answer 17

Black Tern

Question 18

What bird makes these calls at the nest?

Answer 18

Black Tern

Question 19

What is the common name of this bird?

Answer 19

Northern Gannet

Question 20

What is the common name of the bird matching this description?

35-40” (89-102 cm). Huge size, long pointed wings, spearlike bill, pointed tail. Adult is black with white wingtips. Juvenile all gray-brown with white speckles at first, gradually changing to adult plumage over three or four years.

Answer 20

Northern Gannet

Question 21

What birds make these calls when gathered as a colony?

Answer 21

Northern Gannets

Question 22

What is the common name of the bird that, when it nests in colonies, smells of guano and fish?

Answer 22

Northern Gannet

Question 23

What is the common name of the bird that tastes like salty goose or fishy duck?

Answer 23

Northern Gannet

Question 24

What is the common name of the bird with a diet matching this description?

Mainly fish. Feeds mostly on small fish (1-12” in length) of types that live in dense schools, including herring, sand lance, cod, pollack, menhaden. Also may eat some squid. Sometimes scavenges for scraps and offal around fishing boats.

Answer 24

Northern Gannet

Question 25

What bird looks like this in its adult breeding form?

Answer 25

Black Skimmer

Question 26

What is the common name of the bird matching this description? 28" (46 cm). Black above, white below, with lower mandible much longer than upper. Long wings make resting birds look like long, low, black triangle. Juveniles browner above but still unmistakable.

Answer 26

Black Skimmer

Question 27

What is the common name of the bird that makes these barking sounds at colony?

Answer 27

Black Skimmer

Question 28

What is the common name of the bird that makes these churring calls at nest?

Answer 28

Black Skimmer

Question 29

What is the common name of the bird that makes these churring calls at nest?

Answer 29

Black Skimmer

Question 30

What is the common name of the bird that makes these colony calls?

Answer 30

Black Skimmer

Question 31

What is the common name of the bird with a diet matching the following description? Mostly fish. Feeds mostly on small fish that live just below surface of water. Also eats some small crustaceans.

Answer 31

Black Skimmer

Question 32

What is the common name of this bird?

Answer 32

Black Vulture

Question 33

What is the common name of the bird matching this description? 22-24" (56-61 cm). W 4' 6" (1.4 m). Stocky, short-tailed, with big head and broad winds. Soars with wings held flat, and its glides are often punctuated by several quick flaps. Whitish patch near wingtips shows up in flight. Head always dark gray.

Answer 33

Black Vulture

Question 34

What birds do not make any vocalizations?

Answer 34

Black Vulture, ...

Question 35

What birds have a musty smell?

Answer 35

Black Vulture, Turkey Vulture, ...

Question 36

What birds tastes foul likely because they primarily eats foul-tasting things?

Answer 36

Black Vulture, Turkey Vulture

Question 37

What is the common name of the bird with a diet matching this description? Mostly carrion. Feeds on carcasses of dead animals of all sizes. At times also eats eggs of other birds, turtles, lizards. May kill and eat young of some birds, sea turtles; sometimes eats newborn young of larger mammals. Also eats some plant material, such as coconuts and rotting vegetables. Will scavenge scraps of refuse from garbage dumps.

Answer 37

Black Vulture

Question 38

What is the common name of this bird?

Answer 38

Turkey Vulture

Question 39

What is the common name of the bird matching this description? 25-32" (64-81cm). W. 6' (1.8m). Very large with long wings, long tail, small head. Soars with wings held in shallow V; when flapping on takeoff, wingbeats are deep, ponderous. Two-toned look to underwing, black wing-linings against gray flight feathers. Juvenile has gray head, not red.

Answer 39

Turkey Vulture

Question 40

What bird makes this hissing grunt noise?

Answer 40

Turkey Vulture

Question 41

What bird makes this deep hissing grunt noise?

Answer 41

Turkey Vulture

Question 42

What is the common name of the bird with a diet matching this description? Mostly carrion. Feeds mostly on dead animals, preferring those recently dead (that is, relatively fresh carrion). Occasionally feeds on decaying vegetable matter, live insects, or live fish in drying-up ponds.

Answer 42

Turkey Vulture

Question 43

What is the common name of the bird that looks like this when it is in flight?

Answer 43

Red-Shouldered Hawk

Question 44

What is the common name of the bird that looks like this when it is perched?

Answer 44

Red-Shouldered Hawk

Question 45

What is the common name of the bird matching this description? 16-24" (41-61 cm). W. 3'4" (1 m). Larger than Broad-wing, with longer wings and tail. Often flies with several quick flaps and a glide, suggesting the Accipiters. Adult striking: narrow black and white bands on flight feathers of wings and tail, reddish shoulders and crest. West coast birds redder, Florida ones paler, grayer-headed. Juveniles in east are browner, with narrower bars on tail. On all, note pale crescent near wingtip in flight.

Answer 45

Red-shouldered Hawk

Question 46

What is the common name of the bird with this call?

Answer 46

Red-shouldered Hawk

Question 47

What is the common name of the bird with a diet matching this description? Includes small mammals, amphibians, reptiles, birds. Diet varies with region and season. Main items often mammals such as voles and chipmunks, at other times frogs and toads; may eat many crayfish in some areas. Also eats snakes, small birds, mice, large insects, occasionally fish, rarely carrion.

Answer 47

Red-shouldered Hawk

Question 48

What is the common name of this bird?

Answer 48

Red-tailed Hawk

Question 49

What is the common name of the bird matching this description? 18-25" (46-64 cm). W. 4' (1.2 m). On most adults, tail reddish above, whitish below (color shows through in flight overhead). Juvenile's tail brown above, with dark bars. East of the Mississippi, most have white chest, dark "belly-band" of streaks. Western individuals are much more variable, from pale to rust-brown to blackish. (Some are usually dark-bodied and have tail whitish with dark marbling.) On all but the darkest birds, note whitish patches on back. In flight overhead, leading edge of outer wing looks contrastingly dark.

Answer 49

Red-tailed Hawk

Question 50

What is the common name of the bird with this call?

Answer 50

Red-tailed Hawk

Question 51

What is the common name of the bird with a diet matching this description? Varied, includes small mammals, birds, reptiles. Diet varies with location and season. Mammals such as voles, rats, rabbits, and ground squirrels often major prey; also eats many birds (up to size of pheasant) and reptiles, especially snakes. Sometimes eats bats, frogs, toads, insects, various other creatures; may feed on carrion.

Answer 51

Red-tailed Hawk

Question 52

What is the common name of this bird?

Answer 52

Sharp-shinned Hawk

Question 53

What is the common name of the bird matching this description? 10-14" (25-36 cm). W. 21 (53 cm). Adults blue-gray above, pale reddish below; young brown above, striped below. Small size is sometimes apparent. Tip of tail usually looks squared off (but can look rounded, especially when spread); also looks small-headed and has pencil-thin legs. Juvenile may show more blurry streaking below than young Cooper's. Also compare to American Kestrel and Merlin.

Answer 53

Sharp-shinned Hawk

Question 54

What is the common name of the bird that makes these alarm calls?

Answer 54

Sharp-shinned Hawk

Question 55

What is the common name of the bird that makes these squealing calls in flight?

Answer 55

Sharp-shinned Hawk