Northern Mockingbird: how to recognise it
A bird of Europe, North America and Oceania. Learn the marks that make it easy to identify, then practise with real photographs in Lore.
Practise with real photosAll species guides
Photo © Kevin Milazzo · CC BY-NC-SA · iNaturalist · all photo credits
- Scientific name
- Mimus polyglottos
- Family
- Mockingbirds and Thrashers
- Size
- About 25 cm
- Habitat
- Towns and hedges
- Found in
- Europe, North America and Oceania
The key marks
A slim grey bird with white wing patches and white outer tail feathers that flash in flight, and a thin dark bill. Brown Thrasher is rusty-brown with a streaked chest.
Voice
A long string of imitations, each phrase repeated three times.
Good to know
It sings at night and copies dozens of other sounds.
Do not confuse with
Compare it with the Brown Thrasher. Look at the marks above one by one rather than the overall colour, and practise telling the two apart with real photos.
Where and when
You can expect to find it in towns and hedges. It is especially common in Texas, Florida, the United States and Arizona. Distribution changes with the seasons and from year to year, so check a recent local observation source before you go looking.