My favourite bird is the American Bittern.

When they hold their necks upright, they look like reeds.
Pump-er-Lunk was the sound heard in the marshes when I heard it for the first time in real life. I had seen this marsh bird before among the cattails, weirdly enough, and it was just a brown blur as it flew away from me. But this time several of them were heard. They sound a bit like water dripping in a cave. I don't think any make a sound so drip-like.

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/435224/

Do you have any favourite birds you'd like others to know about? Have you seen them? Why are they your favourite?

Wow, that is such a beautiful bird! Thank you for sharing the American Bittern with us!

I haven't caught up with birding crowd yes, but I've been growing increasingly more interested in birds with time. I have an affinity towards mallard ducks as pets, but I think that's more of a pet companion interest than a bird interest, lol. There really are so many interesting birds though, I feel like I'm just beginning to catch the bug.

I've been frequenting a newer park nearby over the past couple of years, and this is where I discovered killdeer. Their broken wing act is really fascinating to me! How clever they appear to play injured in order to lure potential predators away from their nest - yet again, how not so clever they appear to be to lay their eggs on the ground... I wonder why they developed this way

Great egrets and great blue herons might be up there for me, I've seen them around the great lakes, they are so large and graceful looking, and I like to watch them walk around on their stilt legs and spear fish with their beaks!

Yeah that's amazing. Gotta love herons and egrets and bitterns, a lanky yet majestic group of birds. I really love killdeer too, I never saw their broken wing act!
Thanks for sharing! I think birding is a rewarding whereas the most time you spend being "bored" in nature, the more the likelihood of seeing something.

My favorite bird is the toco toucan. Its beak accounts for one-third of its body's length, and up to 40% of the surface of its body. Its call sounds like a bit of a screech, but it's a very cool-looking bird! It has a black body, white throat, white chest, white upper-tail coverts, and red overtail coverts, as well as blue eyes and feet. It's also the largest species of toucan. I've never seen one in person before, but I'd love to.

Yeah so cool! Have you ever seen their skull?

I saw a dude on Insta clean one of those toucans. He had a bird rehabilitation centre.

British Magpies are probably my favourite birds. They're collectors and theives. Back in the days of milk delivery when glass milk bottles were left on doorsteps every morning, they would peck through the foil lid of the bottle to get at the unhomogenised cream.

They have fewer opportunities to steal cream these days as milk is no longer ubiquitous on doorseps in the morning. Magpies are beautiful birds, with an irridescent part of their plumage on their wings. Black and white, otherwise. They have very nicely pointed beaks. They make an annoying sound, that's distinctive enough for even children to recognise. They seem to have a playful, cheeky personality.

I've also always had a soft spot for Robins. They're so tame in my allotment they practically land on the wooden shaft of your shovel while you are working and then start singing. Their song is soft and sweet and so beautiful. It makes me feel like a fairytale princess when they descend on me and sing.

Here's a UK Robin singing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQBr80jdKiM