List of birds of Canada

"Birds of Canada" redirects here. For the banknote series, see Birds of Canada (banknotes).

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The Canada jay has been proposed as the national bird of Canada.[1]

This is a list of bird species confirmed in Canada. Unless otherwise noted, the list is that of Bird Checklists of the World as of July 2022.[2] Of the 704 species listed here, 236 are accidental. Twelve species were introduced to North America or directly to Canada, three species are extinct, and three (possibly four) have been extirpated. One species of uncertain origin is also included.

This list is presented in the taxonomic sequence of the Check-list of North and Middle American Birds, 7th edition through the 63rd Supplement, published by the American Ornithological Society (AOS).[3] Common and scientific names are also those of the Check-list, except that the common names of families are from the Clements taxonomy because the AOS list does not include them.

Canadian birds most closely resemble those of Eurasia, which was connected to the continent as part of the supercontinent Laurasia until around 60 million years ago.[4] Many families which occur in Canada are also found throughout the Northern Hemisphere or worldwide. However, some families are unique to the New World; those represented in this list are the hummingbirds, the New World vultures, the New World quail, the tyrant flycatchers, the mimids, the wood-warblers, the cardinals, and the icterids.[5] Three species on the list (Ross's goose, whooping crane, and Harris's sparrow) breed only in Canada.[3] The extinct Labrador duck is also believed to have been a breeding endemic, though its breeding areas are not known.[6]

Unless otherwise noted, all species listed below are considered to occur regularly in Canada as permanent residents, summer or winter visitors, or migrants. These tags are used to annotate some species:

  • (A) Accidental - a species that rarely or accidentally occurs in Canada
  • (I) Introduced - a species introduced to Canada as a consequence, direct or indirect, of human actions
  • (E) Extinct - a recent species which no longer exists
  • (Ex) Extirpated - a species which no longer occurs in Canada but exists elsewhere

Population status symbols are those of the Red List published by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).[7] The symbols apply to the species' worldwide status, not their status solely in Canada. The symbols and their meanings, in decreasing order of peril, are:

EX Extinct No reasonable doubt that the last individual has died.
EW Extinct in the wild Known only to survive in captivity or as a naturalized population well outside its previous range.
CR Critically endangered The species is in imminent risk of extinction in the wild.
EN Endangered The species is facing an extremely high risk of extinction in the wild.
VU Vulnerable The species is facing a high risk of extinction in the wild.
NT Near threatened The species does not meet any of the criteria that would categorise it as risking extinction but it is likely to do so in the future.
LC Least concern There are no current identifiable risks to the species.
DD Data deficient There is inadequate information to make an assessment of the risks to this species.


  1. ^ "The National Bird Project". The Royal Canadian Geographical Society and Canadian Geographic. Retrieved July 1, 2017.
  2. ^ Lepage, Denis (March 13, 2021). "Checklist of Birds of Canada". Avibase bird checklists of the world. Retrieved August 12, 2021.
  3. ^ a b Chesser, R. T., S. M. Billerman, K. J. Burns, C. Cicero, J. L. Dunn, B. E. Hernández-Baños, R. A. Jiménez, A. W. Kratter, N. A. Mason, P. C. Rasmussen, J. V. Remsen, Jr., D. F. Stotz, and K. Winker. 2022. Check-list of North American Birds (online). American Ornithological Society. (July 29, 2022). "Check-list of North and Middle American Birds". American Ornithological Society. Retrieved July 7, 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  4. ^ "Historical perspective". U.S. Geological Survey. Retrieved April 21, 2008.
  5. ^ Clements, J. F., T. S. Schulenberg, M. J. Iliff, D. Roberson, T. A. Fredericks, B. L. Sullivan, and C. L. Wood. 2016. The eBird/Clements Checklist of Birds of the World: v2016. Downloaded from http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/download/ retrieved 11 August 2016.
  6. ^ Chilton, G. (2020). Labrador Duck (Camptorhynchus labradorius), version 1.0. In Birds of the World (A. F. Poole and F. B. Gill, Editors). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.labduc.01. Retrieved February 24, 2021.
  7. ^ IUCN 2019. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2019-2. http://www.iucnredlist.org. Downloaded on July 29, 2019.