Bird games for adults and kids

Pick a day and see how many different species you can find from your yard or block, from dawn to dusk. Play solo to beat last year's total, or split up with friends and compare lists at dinner.

Scoring is simple: one point per species, and every bird must be identified for sure. Bonus point for the first bird of the morning and for anything nobody else saw. If you log your list in eBird on its Global Big Day in May or October, your sightings help scientists too.

Write the letters A to Z down a page. Fill in each letter with a bird you've actually seen: A for American Robin, B for Blue Jay, C for Cardinal. First to fill the alphabet wins, or see who gets furthest by the end of the season.

Q, X, and Z are the tough ones. House rules help: let birders count any word in the name (Northern Mockingbird can be N or M), and let one wild card cover a missing letter.

Step outside early on a spring or summer morning, stand still, and listen. When a bird sings, everyone writes down a guess before anyone checks. Then use Merlin's Sound ID to confirm. A correct guess scores a point.

Indoors or in winter, take turns playing a song from Merlin's species pages while the others guess. It's the fastest way to learn birding by ear, and it gets surprisingly competitive.

Before the coffee is ready, everyone names the bird they think will land on the feeder first. Closest guess picks the music, skips the dishes, or whatever stakes your house plays for.

To make it harder, guess the first three visitors in order. A window feeder makes it easy to call close finishes.

With a few friends, keep a running list of every species each of you sees from January 1 to December 31. Post new birds to the group chat as you find them. Whoever has the longest list at New Year's picks the restaurant for the next get-together.

Add a yard-only division for friends who don't travel, and a photo rule if you want proof.

Line up the crayons. Each time your child spots a bird, they pick up the crayon that matches its main color. Who can collect all six first? A cardinal is red, a jay is blue, a goldfinch is yellow, a chickadee is black and white.

Afterward, use the same crayons to draw the birds you found. Younger kids love it, and it trains them to look closely at a bird's colors, which is the first step to identifying it.

Sit outside together and close your eyes for one minute. Every time someone hears a different bird, they hold up a finger. When the minute is up, compare: how many birds did you each hear? Then open your eyes and try to find one of them.

It's a great calming game, and it shows kids that there are always more birds around than you can see.

One player acts out a bird and everyone else guesses which one. Hop and tilt your head like a robin listening for worms, hover with fast arms like a hummingbird, peck at a tree like a woodpecker, or walk headfirst down a wall like a nuthatch.

Watch the feeder first to collect ideas. Kids remember birds much better after they've moved like them.

Set a timer for 10 minutes and count the most birds of each kind that you see at the feeder at the same time. Write the numbers down and make a simple bar chart on the fridge. Do it every weekend and see how the chart changes with the seasons.

Families can send their counts to Project FeederWatch, a real science project from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that runs every winter from November to April.