Birds of Indiana

Indiana has no coast and no mountain, so people assume it has nothing to listen to. The list says otherwise: the Indiana Bird Records Committee counted 422 species on the state list as of January 2022. The north edge touches Lake Michigan, and the dunes there have recorded more than 350 species, which puts a small national park in the top five in the country. The northwest corner is old marsh country along the Kankakee, where more than 30,000 Sandhill Cranes gather in fall. The south is limestone hills and river bottoms that sound more like Kentucky than Chicago.

In between is corn, soybeans, small towns and a lot of maples, and the album leaders are the birds that live in that: cardinal, robin, jay, dove, goldfinch, two woodpeckers, crow, titmouse and nuthatch. Learn those ten and you understand an Indiana morning in any county.

The Indiana album

These are the 100 birds people report most often in Indiana, ranked by how frequently they turn up. The common and uncommon ones are shown; the rare and legendary cards stay face down until you catch them in the game.

Backyard birds you will hear first

The Northern Cardinal is the most reported bird in the state and the easiest to learn: loud slurred whistles, cheer, cheer and birdy, birdy, birdy, plus a sharp metallic chip from the hedge at dusk. The American Robin takes over before dawn from March to July, and the Blue Jay screams from the oaks.

The American Goldfinch is the fifth most reported bird, and you usually hear it before you see it: a bouncy po-ta-to-chip as it dips over the driveway in July, when it finally nests. At the feeder, the Downy Woodpecker whinnies, the Red-bellied Woodpecker rolls a churr, the Tufted Titmouse whistles peter, peter, peter, and the White-breasted Nuthatch honks like a tiny tin horn. The Song Sparrow sings from the same fence post all summer.

The regions, by ear

Lake Michigan and the dunes

Indiana Dunes National Park is a strip of beach, foredune, oak woods and remnant Great Marsh squeezed between steel mills, with more than 350 confirmed species. In fall, southbound birds follow the shoreline and get funneled into the dunes, and hawk watchers count them from the foredunes. In summer the oak woods are towhee and yellowthroat country, a drink-your-tea, witchety-witchety kind of morning, and in winter the open lake holds ducks and gulls.

The Kankakee marsh country

The northwest was once one huge marsh, and Jasper-Pulaski Fish and Wildlife Area near Medaryville, about 8,000 acres of wetland, upland and woods, is where the Sandhill Cranes remember it. More than 30,000 stop there on fall migration, and from the viewing platform at dusk the sound is a rattling roar that carries for a mile.

The central till plain

Flat fields, fencerows, ditches and county roads. Eastern Meadowlarks whistle from the wires, Killdeer cry over gravel, Horned Larks tinkle above bare ground in March, and every retention pond has a Canada Goose on it.

The southern hills and bottoms

Below Indianapolis the ground folds into wooded ridges and river bottoms. Muscatatuck National Wildlife Refuge near Seymour, a Continentally Important Bird Area of marshes and moist-soil units, has Sandhill Cranes on the wet fields and woods full of song in May. The Wood Thrush flutes from the ravines at dusk, and the Barred Owl asks who cooks for you after dark.

Best months to listen

Late April through May is the peak, when residents are singing for territory and warblers are moving through the dunes and the river woods. June is still loud at dawn. Fall is quieter for songbirds, and November is crane month at Jasper-Pulaski. Winter is feeder birds, crows going to roost, and ducks and gulls on the open lake. In any month, the first two hours after sunrise carry the song.

Places worth the drive

• Indiana Dunes National Park, between Gary and Michigan City: more than 350 species, warblers in May, hawks and funneled migrants along the shore in fall.
• Jasper-Pulaski Fish and Wildlife Area, near Medaryville: more than 30,000 Sandhill Cranes in fall, best at dusk from the platform.
• Muscatatuck National Wildlife Refuge, east of Seymour: marshes, moist-soil units and woods, cranes in the wetlands and river otters in the ditches.
• Goose Pond Fish and Wildlife Area, near Linton: about 9,000 acres of restored shallow wetland and prairie, more than 280 species recorded.

None of them is required. A yard with a feeder and a maple gives you the first 25 cards of the Warble album by May.

Listen before you go

Three of the common Indiana birds, so the first songs you hear outside already ring a bell.

Canada Goose song

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Recording by Chase Harris, CC0, via iNaturalist.

Wood Duck song

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Recording by Chase Harris, CC0, via iNaturalist.

Mallard song

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Recording by Fionn Ó Marcaigh, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist.

Questions people ask

Nearby albums

Album data: public bird observations aggregated through GBIF, ranked by report frequency in Indiana. Updated September 30, 2026.