What bird sounds like a horse whinnying?

A whinny from the trees at night is most likely an Eastern Screech-Owl, a small owl of eastern woods, parks and wooded suburbs whose call is a quavering wail that slides down the scale like a miniature horse. A whinny from a cattail marsh is more likely a Sora, a small rail whose loud, squeaky whinny slows down and drops in pitch as it goes. On a weedy pond in the warm months, the Pied-billed Grebe adds whinnying and gobbling noises of its own, by day or by night.

Listen: the Eastern Screech-Owl

The comparison is not a stretch. The screech-owl's call is a tremolo, a shaky run of notes, and it falls in pitch the way a horse's whinny does, only smaller and softer. It is a quiet sound for an owl, so when you hear it clearly the bird is usually close, often in a yard tree or the edge of a park. The name is misleading: these owls do not really screech. Their second sound is a purring trill held on one note for three to five seconds, which can pass for a toad if you are not expecting an owl.

Screech-owls live in eastern North America from Canada down into Mexico, in open mixed woods, deciduous forest, parkland and leafy suburbs. They stay put all year, so the whinny can turn up in any month, but they call most on spring nights during the breeding season. By day the owl sits tucked into a tree hole or thick cover, and it starts moving around at dusk. If you do spot one, look for a robin-sized owl with short ear tufts it can raise or flatten, in gray, reddish or brown.

Other birds that whinny

The Sora is a small, chunky rail with a short yellow bill and a black face, and you will almost never see it. It is far more often heard than seen, walking through cattails, sedges and bulrushes in water less than a foot deep. Its whinny is the call it uses to advertise a territory: a loud, squealing series that loses speed and pitch as it goes. The other common call is softer and rises at the end, a ker-wee or sor-ah that gave the bird its name. Soras breed in marshes from southern Canada and the northern states south to California, Arizona and New Mexico, nesting from late April into early August, and they turn up on migration in almost every state.

The Pied-billed Grebe is a compact, brown diving bird with a thick bill, white with a black ring in breeding season, and it is the most widespread grebe in the Americas. During the breeding season, which can run from early spring to mid-autumn where the weather allows, it makes strange whinnying, gobbling and cooing noises at any hour, sometimes with its mate in duet. It hides in heavy marsh growth near open water, and when something worries it, it can sink slowly until only its head shows, which is one reason a pond can sound busy and look empty.

How to tell which one you heard

• Where it came from. Up in a tree in a yard, park or woodlot: screech-owl. Down in cattails or reeds: Sora. From a marshy pond with open water: Pied-billed Grebe.
• How loud it was. The owl's whinny is soft and wavering. The Sora's is loud and squeaky, and it clearly decelerates as it falls.
• What else it said. A screech-owl often adds a steady, one-note trill. A Sora mixes in rising ker-wee calls. A grebe adds hollow, cuckoo-like cow notes and clucks.
• What time of year it is. The owl can call in any month, with a peak in spring. Soras and grebes do their whinnying in the nesting season, from spring into summer, and northern birds of both leave for the winter.

If the sound is in a marsh in midsummer, the rail is the better bet; if it is in a shady neighborhood in winter, it is almost certainly the owl. And if a whinny seems to repeat, a few seconds of recording on your phone will settle a lot of arguments. Warble can listen to that same call and name the bird, though a single faint whinny far off in the dark may leave it unsure.

Questions people ask

Warble is a game, not a field guide. Facts about birds on this page come from the sources above.