# Identify this bird.
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [April 21, 2005, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406 "2005-04-21T13:39:55Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)
#### Post date: [April 21, 2005, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406/1 "2005-04-21T13:39:55Z")
Sorry, no pics because if I could find a pic, I’d know what to call him.
I’ve been calling him a “mockingbird” because he sits in the tree and runs through a progression of clicks, chirps, songs, clucks and everything else.
So, I just went to find a picture of “mockingbirds” and he doesn’t look like any of them.
What he looks like is blackish/greenish metallic feathers, kind of like an oil slick with a yellow (IIRC) longish beak. He has specks on his wings, and his “hair” is kind of “spikey” but not as spikey as a kingfisher.
He’s not as big as a pigeon, but he’s a good sized bird.
He eats off the ground, maybe insects, but maybe seeds.
I think the females are duller, smaller, and brownish but they just might be a sparrow whose company he enjoys.
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### Author:  [@TwoTrouts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TwoTrouts)
#### Post date: [April 21, 2005, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406/2 "2005-04-21T13:57:15Z")
Sounds like a [Starling](http://www.learner.org/jnorth/images/graphics/s/Starling.jpg) to me.
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### Author:  [@capybara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capybara)
#### Post date: [April 21, 2005, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406/3 "2005-04-21T14:02:59Z")
Yeah, that sounds like a starling-- they have impressive wacky vocal repertoires. Other people hate them, but they amuse me. A mockingbird will sound more like one of the 1990s car alarms: woop woop woop erk erk erk pfweeew pfweeew pfweeew Arnk Arnk Arnk woop woop woop ad nauseum. Starlings sound less . . . standard.
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### Author:  [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)
#### Post date: [April 21, 2005, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406/4 "2005-04-21T14:25:17Z")
That would be him.
Baltimore Bird Club lists him as "European Starling and says he is “abundant” in the Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter which would match my experience.
[http://baltimorebirdclub.org/baltreg.html](http://baltimorebirdclub.org/baltreg.html)
Thanks. . .that kind of thing eats at me.
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### Author:  [@cher3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cher3)
#### Post date: [April 21, 2005, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406/5 "2005-04-21T14:53:04Z")
Starlings will also sometimes spontaneously do the “wolf whistle,” which can be kind of disconcerting.
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### Author:  [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [April 22, 2005, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406/6 "2005-04-22T00:03:12Z")
Starlings, like Mockingbirds, are great mimics. They copy the songs of other birds - it can be very interesting trying to identifying exactly what they are mimicking. They can even be taught to mimic human speech (they are related to Myna birds). [You can hear some talking Starlings here](http://www.starlingcentral.net/starlingmedia.htm).
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### Author:  [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)
#### Post date: [April 22, 2005, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406/7 "2005-04-22T02:47:48Z")
> [@Colibri](#):
>
> [You can hear some talking Starlings here](http://www.starlingcentral.net/starlingmedia.htm).
Holy crap, that is some creepy stuff!
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### Author:  [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [April 22, 2005, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-bird/300406/8 "2005-04-22T02:57:44Z")
> [@Lance Turbo](#):
>
> Holy crap, that is some creepy stuff!
Yeah, they kind of sound like lost spirits, don’t they? I think Starlings could do pretty good voice effects for a horror movie if you trained them.
A Starling was the favorite pet of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and may have inspired his [\*Musical Joke](http://www.homepages.indiana.edu/042602/text/cowbirds.html).\*