lonestranger

This looks like a Red-tailed hawk to me. The tail has thin strips where a Cooper's hawk would have much wider stripes, on a longer tail.

Whatbird has a very limited amount of photo storage, @NorEastBirder. Photos uploaded to the Gallery have to be less than 31mb, which may be part of your problem, plus there is very low limit on the total storage space. Most of us use a third party website such as imgur, flickr, etc., for photo storage and then link/embed our photos in our posts here. Not many people actually use the photo gallery so not many of us can offer advise on how to best make use of it.

This is a Northern Flicker, a type of woodpecker that usually eats ants on the ground instead of pecking for food in the trees like most other woodpeckers. A better name would be, White-rumped groundpecker because that's usually how they're viewed, head down pecking the ground with it's white rump up in the air.

No worries, @Lisaaaaa38. I just posted so that people respond to just one post. It helps avoid confusion by keeping the discussion focused in one spot. With three separate posts, it's possible to get 3 different suggestions for the same bird, leading to three separate discussions/debates about the identifying markers used to validate the ID. One post just keeps things simpler.

This is a duplicate/triplicate of yesterday's bird, which has already been ID'd.

This is a duplicate/triplicate post of yesterday's bird, which has already been ID'd.

This was taken out our dining room window after an ice storm a few winters back. DSCN4547 by lonestranger102, on Flickr

A couple from Algonquin Park, taken nearly 10 years ago. Untitled by lonestranger102, on Flickr Untitled by lonestranger102, on Flickr Untitled by lonestranger102, on Flickr

Do female Cardinals take on male characteristics once they stop breeding? Just tossing the idea out because it's been mentioned before that some female birds start to look like their male counterparts once they go through the change of life. I think the comment was referring to ducks at the time, but I'm not sure if it's limited to just ducks. Just a thought.

Yep, I'm cheating here. xwing Cedar Wa-

@Charlie Spencer I think PV-John was referring to Whatbird's ID search engine, https://identify.whatbird.com/mwg/_/0/attrs.aspx and not the forums specifically when he mentioned the absence of the Golden-cheeked Woodpecker.

Welcome to Whatbird, PV-John. As Egosnell2002 stated, the birds listed in the whatbird search database include birds of North America. Some Mexican birds appear in the database because they frequent the USA and Canada frequent enough to be part of the ABA checklist. If a bird doesn't make it to the ABA checklist, or similar checklist, it's probably not listed in the Whatbird database just like they're not listed in most North American Field Guides. Or something like that, more experienced birders may be able to explain that more accurately than I did.

I have always had a hard time distinguishing these two apart when I only get a quick glimpse of them. I'm often second guessing myself about the size of the bird and waffling back and forth on whether it was actually big enough for a grosbeak or small enough to be a finch. When we just get a quick glimpse, my sweetie will often hear me say, "That was a female Rose-breasted Grosbeak...I think." Then she has listen to me explain how hard it can be to judge size and my disclaimer that it might have actually been a female Purple Finch.

Male and female Evening Grosbeaks with the 2 females in the middle. While I see them almost yearly when I travel up north, I don't think I have seen Evening Grosbeaks at my feeders since I took this photo back in 2012...until today when a single female showed up on our platform feeder for some sunflower seeds. Untitled by lonestranger102, on Flickr

Male(left) and female(right) Common Redpolls. Untitled by lonestranger102, on Flickr

While both male and female Trumpeter Swans are similar and not considered sexually dimorphic, sometimes it's pretty easy to tell them apart. Untitled by lonestranger102, on Flickr

Female(left) and male(right) Pileated Woodpeckers. IMG_3533 by lonestranger102, on Flickr

Female(left) and male(right) Baltimore Orioles. Untitled by lonestranger102, on Flickr Female(left) and male(right) Ring-necked Ducks. Untitled by lonestranger102, on Flickr

Welcome to Whatbird, Getchell. If the bird sings every morning, I suggest getting a recording and posting it for the experts to listen to. As you can see by the variety of suggestions so far, a written description of a bird song is hard to nail down, a recording on the other hand makes an ID much easier for the experts.

I had considered a "Bird Sex" thread like this one but thought a title like mine would need a disclaimer explaining that it wasn't about sex.

Looks like your view of the drive thru is a lot different than the view of house sparrows I usually see at the drive thru. Very cool to be able see that kind of behaviour up close and personal. While I hear the owls in my yard quite often, I have only caught a glimpse of a silhouette quickly flying out of site on one occasion. I'm like you, I suppose, when I know the owls are around I am afraid to go looking for them out of fear of chasing them off to someone else's backyard.

Welcome to Whatbird, Corgi. I agree with @Spyonabird, don't feel overwhelmed or worried about the quality of your photos. Speaking from my own experience as a long time viewer of the photos on Whatbird, I find that I enjoy seeing the bad photos just as much as the good ones, sometimes more so. Especially if a lesser quality photo has more of a story behind it than the great photos do, it's just more likely to hold my interest longer. They say a picture paints a thousand words and tells it's own story, well, I like it when a picture/photo comes with a few extra words as part of the story and/or backstory. Knowing more about the photo and the experience one had while capturing it, well, lets just say that I enjoying reading the "discussion" part of the Photo Sharing and Discussion forum as much as I enjoying seeing the photos shared, whether they're good or bad. Enjoy yourself sharing your photos with us and everyone will enjoy that you shared them. As far your question about lenses go, I'm not an expert but I'm willing to bet, not much mind you, but I'd bet that they'd be compatible with one of the newer digital cameras. I have no idea which camera but if you took your lenses into one of the real camera stores they'd be able to tell you what cameras your lenses are compatible with and have you setup and ready to go in no time. When I say "real camera store" I am referring to one of the camera stores that has knowledgable staff that know their stuff, not a big box store that sells everything and the staff knows very little about any of it. If the camera store can't fit your lenses to the camera you want, ask them if they can help you find an alternative or maybe an adapter that would accommodate your lenses. Sorry I can't really help except to suggest that you take your lenses with you and ask someone more knowledgeable how you can utilize them.

Your joke still works in english, at least in my adult head mind it does.

Welcome to Whatbird, ndgoodell. I can't help with your ID, but there are others here that know their hummingbirds quite well and should be able to help you soon. If you get impatient, you could use the more popular North American ID Forum and ask for someone to have a look at your images here. The same people usually help with ID's in both forums, but this forum can get overlooked sometimes. No harm in drawing attention to your post here by asking for help there. By the way, great photos of the hummingbirds.

Sorry Johnd. Please forgive my poor attempt at humour here, but it looks like a wrong turn.