Andy Camper

Birds of a Feather

Collect It

Andy's Guide to Bird Watching

Birds are beautiful creatures, that are easy to find and fun to observe. They’re also one of the most popular creatures with millions of enthusiastic members in bird watching and conservation societies around the world.  In fact more people in North America watch birds than baseball and hockey combined!

Bird watching takes little more than stepping outside and looking for one in a tree, perched on a house or pecking at the ground. Binoculars can help you spot birds from a distance. Having a camera can be fun to snap pictures of what you find and then inspect them up close whenever you like! With a video camera you can record their behaviour and calls and sounds too. If you don’t have a camera handy try sketching it in a notebook and jot down notes on what the bird was doing you saw it. The chart on the right of the page can help you record your findings.

There are lots of neat things to check out when trying to identify a bird… Colour, size, shape, type of bill, songs, habitat and other behaviour are all important clues.  Refer to the field notes in the Discover it section to see what kinds of birds are found in your area during the current season to help narrow down what type of bird it is.

If you can’t find many birds in your area, why not make a bird feeder or build a bird house to attract them right to your backyard!?