You may have noticed that almost every species of passerine bird has a particular method of flying.

Woodpeckers (including northern flickers), goldfinches and nuthatches have a flight that is similar. I, (not officially) call it a power stroke.

They have a couple of flaps, causing them to rise up a bit, then a short “rest” and another couple of flaps. It’s almost like watching waves roll into the beach — crest and trough, crest and trough, etc.

If you feed birds and woodpeckers are among the beneficiaries of your handouts, watch them as they fly away to a nearby tree. Mourning doves burst from the ground with very rapid wing beats with a whistling sound. While flying they have steady, very powerful wing beats.

Grackles and blue jays have characteristic flights, too; just a slow steady wing beat. Ring-necked pheasants and grouse explode from the ground with loud flapping sounds but are not adapted to any long flights or soaring.

Well, raptors (hawks, vultures and owls) also have a specific way of flying.

The accipiters, sharp-shinned and Cooper’s hawks, fly with a flap, flap, glide pattern. They have shorter, semi-rounded wings that are conducive for maneuvering through a forest to pursue or catch an unsuspecting bird. In migration, that short group of flaps and a glide is a giveaway.

Buteos, the soaring hawks, will have a steady wing beat pattern, or as in the case of migrating broad-winged hawks, they extend the wing feathers as much as possible to catch thermals and use those to drift almost effortlessly higher and higher. Look for the flat wing profile while the bird is soaring.

Large raptors like bald eagles, golden eagles, ospreys and vultures that have wingspans of more than 5 feet have slow and more labored wing beats. (Since the wings are so long, they have to have a slower wing beat.) Long before you can see an eagle’s head, the slow wing beat should be a great clue that you’ve spied one.

Turkey vultures have weaker breast muscles, most likely an adaptation to conserve weight since they soar almost all the time. They hold their wings upward in a slight V shape called a dihedral.

Black vultures have shorter wings. Their wing profile is flatter, more like an eagle, but they characteristically flap six or eight wing beats then soar, and repeat that process.

Note: Most people aren’t nighttime birders and seldom see an owl in flight. Owls don’t soar like a broad-winged hawk or dart through the woods like a Cooper’s hawk. Their flight is strong but very quiet. The reason? Their wing feathers are slightly fringed at the edges, and their flight is nearly undetectable, which is so necessary for an owl to fly to a perch and then drop on prey without a sound.

As winter bird feeding time approaches, watch how the various species of birds fly to and from your feeders. You’ll soon be able to tell them apart just by the way they fly.

Also, before the end of the month, when most of the turkey vultures head a little farther south, watch closely how well they soar and their gentle rocking motion with the dihedral wing profile. But to see these things, you’ll have to get out there …

Test Your Outdoor Knowledge: A bald eagle will not get the beautiful white head and tail until they mature at ____ years of age. A. 2; B. 3; C. 5; D. 10.

Last Week’s Trivia Answer: The American beech is noted for retaining many of its leaves throughout winter. They don’t remain green, though, since the chlorophyll in them has died. The dead leaves often persist until the new leaves begin to sprout in spring.

Email Barry Reed at breed71@gmail.com