Don’t worry – when taking a tour with AlpineBirding, you will always be accompanied by one of our bilingual guides. So, you do not really need to know any Chinese. Still, it might be fun to learn a few bird names and terms that are useful when birding – if only to casually drop a Chinese bird name into a conversation when telling your buddies at home about your trip. So, here are a few Chinese words useful or interesting for birders – many related to bird names, some to birding, and a few to bird photography.

Bird Names

Generally, Chinese bird names tend to be relatively descriptive, highlighting a specific part of the bird. Birds are rarely named after people. Here are a few Chinese bird names that are particularly interesting.

Owls in Chinese are called 猫头鹰 [māo tóu yīng], which literally translates to “Cat head eagle” – hard to describe an owl more accurately, right?

A cat head eagle (Oriental Scops Owl, Nanhui, Shanghai).

Also note the cute character for cat, 猫 – many Chinese characters are originally derived from pictograms, and with a bit of imagination, you can still see the cat in the character.

In Chinese, woodpeckers are 啄木鸟 [zhuó mù niǎo], peck wood birds (by the way, the character for bird, 鸟 [niǎo], also looks cute). Quite similar to the English name, then. But it gets more interesting when we get to barbets, such as the Great Barbet: its Chinese name is 大拟啄木鸟 [dà nǐ zhuó mù niǎo], or big imitation woodpecker. So, barbets are all fake woodpeckers in Chinese.

A Great Fake Woodpecker (Great Barbet, Baihualing, Yunnan).

Another beauty we can sometimes see on migration on China's East Coast is the Fairy Pitta. The Chinese name indicates the number of colors this bird has – it is 仙八色鸫 [xiān bā sè dōng], the Eight-colored Fairy Thrush. 

How many colors? (Fairy Pitta, Nanhui, Shanghai).

For some birds, the English and Chinese languages seem to disagree on what the most important characteristic is. When an English-speaking birder sees a Yellow-rumped Flycatcher, the Chinese birder next to him sees a White-browed Flycatcher, 白眉姬鹟 [bái méi jī wēng] in Chinese.

White-browed or Yellow-rumped or both? (Yellow-rumped Flycatcher, Nanhui, Shanghai).

The Black-faced Bunting is seen a bit differently in Chinese – it is 灰头鹀 [huī tóu wú], or Grey-headed Bunting. Ok, face and head are not exactly the same, but in this case, the Chinese name may make a bit more sense. 

A Grey-headed Bunting (Black-faced Bunting, Chongming Island, Shanghai).

Similarly, while the foreign birder sees a long-tailed shrike, the Chinese birder focuses on the brown back and thus can even recognize the bird when (during molting) the tail feathers are missing.

A Brown-backed Shrike, 棕背伯劳 [zōng bèi bó láo] (Long-tailed Shrike, Chongming Island, Shanghai).

And while both the Chinese and the foreign birder agree that there is some green color in this dove, the foreigner focuses on the white belly of the White-bellied Green Pigeon while the Chinese birder apparently finds the red wings more characteristic.

A Red-winged Green Dove, 红翅绿鸠 [hóng chì lǜ jiū] (White-bellied Green Pigeon, Shanghai).

The Chinese like crafts – they often value skilled craftsmanship at least as high as creativity. Embroidery is one of these crafts. To celebrate it, they call White-eyes 绣眼 [xiù yǎn], the embroidered-eye birds. This name is very vivid – take a careful look at the white ring, its fine-grained structure is very similar to embroidery indeed.  

See my embroidered eye? (Swinhoe's White-Eye, Nanhui).

Why would the Chinese call a pheasant a horse chicken? Because its tail looks like the tail of a horse.

A Blue Horse Chicken, 蓝马鸡 [lán mǎ jī](Blue eared-pheasant, Ruoergai area).

Pipa is a traditional musical instrument that looks a bit like a Western lute. In Chinese, the instrument has given its name to the spoonbills such as the Black-faced Spoonbill, 黑脸琵鹭 [hēi liǎn pí lù] – the pi in the name indicates that the bill of the bird resembles a pipa.

A very musical bird (Black-faced Spoonbill, Nanhui, Shanghai).

You would think that the Spoon-billed Sandpiper then would likely have a similar name. But it does not. Instead, it is a Spoon-mouthed Snipe, 勺嘴鹬 [sháo zuǐ yù].

A Spoon-mouthed Snipe (Spoon-billed Sandpiper, Tiaozini, China).

And the word Hwamei in Chinese means painted eyebrow. Why name a bird after this? You can see it in the photo. 

画眉 [huà méi]. See, I painted my eyebrow for you birders (Hwamei, Tianmushan).

One of the most common birds in Shanghai is the Light-vented Bulbul – a name that sounds like some rather pretentious person came up with it. The Chinese are a bit more down to earth and just call it the White-headed Bulbul, 白头鹎 [bái tóu bēi].

While my white head is easy to see, my light vent is not (Light-vented Bulbul, Shanghai).

Have you ever seen a fish dog--鱼狗 [yú gǒu]? We see them on many of our trips, as this is the Chinese name for some kingfishers. Again, both Chinese characters are derived from pictorial representations of fish (鱼) and dog (狗), though their shape has changed quite a bit with time.

A Striped Fish Dog, 斑鱼狗 [bān yú gǒu] (Pied Kingfisher, Fengxian, Shanghai).

You may be able to figure out yourself what a black water chicken, 黑水鸡 [hēi shuǐ jī] looks like, or what the English name of this common bird might be?

A Black Water Chicken, aka Common Moorhen (Chongming, Shanghai).

Another nicely descriptive Chinese name is that of the Baikal Teal, or Flower-faced Duck, 花脸鸭 [huā liǎn yā].

A Flower-faced Duck (Baikal Teal, Chongming, Shanghai).

Imagine you are a bee. Would you think that bee-eaters are cute? Probably not. It seems the Chinese name of bee-eaters reflects this bee perspective – bee-eaters are bee tigers.

A Green-throated Bee Tiger, 绿喉蜂虎 [lǜ hóu fēng hǔ] (Green Bee-Eater, Nabang, Yunnan).

A rather strange Chinese name is that of the Crested Myna:八哥 [bā gē], or “Eight brothers”.

One bird, eight brothers (Crested Myna, Shanghai).

Finally, what about all the English bird names starting with “Chinese”? The Handbook of the Birds of the World lists almost 30 such species. As you can imagine, most of these lose this part of their name when referred to by Chinese birders. Instead, the “Chinese” is often replaced by some characteristic part of the bird in question (such as a wedged tail), or the “Chinese” is simply left out. Presumably, while for those who gave the English names, the Chinese origin was an interesting fact in itself that could thus reasonably form part of the name, for local Chinese this makes much less sense.

A Wedge-tailed Shrike, 楔尾伯劳 [xiē wěi bó láo] (Chinese Grey Shrike, Dulan County, Qinghai, China).

A simple “Pond Heron”, 池鹭 [chí lù] (Chinese Pond Heron, Shanghai).

But this is not always the case – for example, the Chinese Penduline Tit becomes a climbing sparrow but stays Chinese.

A Chinese Climbing Sparrow, 中华攀雀 [zhōng huá pān què] (Chinese Penduline Tit, Shanghai).

One thing is similar about Chinese and English bird names, though – sometimes they are a bit strange. For example, both the Chinese and the English name of the White-throated Rock Thrush, 白喉矶鸫 [bái hóu jī dōng],  highlight something that seems much less conspicuous than the colorful plumage of the bird.

White-throated? You mean Rufous-rumped and Blue-capped and Black-eared Rock Thrush all were already taken? (White-throated Rock Thrush, Nanhui, Shanghai).

And for some birds, both languages display a remarkable lack of creativity in assigning names. So, parallel to the Little, Intermediate, and Great Egret known to Western birders, the Chinese speak of the White, Intermediate White, and Great White Egret.

A Medium White Egret,中白鹭 [zhōng bái lù] (Intermediate Egret, Nanhui, Shanghai).

Birding

The Chinese call birding “观鸟[guān niǎo]”, which is admittedly not very exciting – it just means to observe birds. There is a difference to the English language here, though – while an English speaker will watch both birds and watch TV, the Chinese language distinguishes between the rather informal “看[kàn]” (see, watch) for your TV habits and the more formal “观[guān]” (watch, observe) for birding. Maybe the Chinese have a higher regard for the latter activity. On the other hand, to be honest, the Chinese also talk about “看鸟[kàn niǎo]”. Maybe people are not so different after all.

A bird hide in Chinese is a “鸟塘[niǎo táng]”, literally a “bird pond” (in fact, even Chinese speaking English talk about bird ponds, not bird hides). That somewhat makes a lot of sense – after all, the reason why you go there is to see the place where the birds are (the pond), not to see the hide.

Incidentally (though not particularly birding specific), it is interesting that you can sometimes tell an English speaker is of Chinese origin-based not just on the accent but based on typical grammatical mistakes. For example, a Chinese birder might tell you that he will “wait you here” (rather than “wait for you here”), as the equivalent Chinese term “在这儿等你[zài zhè ér děng nǐ]” does not require the “for” the English language asks for. 

If you get a lifer on one of our tours, a Chinese birder might congratulate you for “加新[jiā xīn]”, adding a new one. No need to mention that it is a bird if the conversation is in the right context (if you talk about a lifer among birders, nobody will think you talk about a prisoner either).

What do you think a resentment species might be “怨念种[Yuànniàn zhǒng]”? Use your imagination … yes, that is the Chinese term for a nemesis bird.

On the other hand, very common birds at a specific location are described as “Vegetable birds”,” 菜鸟[cài niǎo]”. We are still trying to understand why ourselves. 

Finally, you may want to know what twitching is in Chinese: Pushing birds,推鸟[tuī niǎo]. Makes sense, doesn’t it?

Bird Photography

What you might hear when walking around birding carrying a big telephoto lens is people mentioning your “大炮[dà pào]”, your “big gun”. Rest assured they do not want to make any sexually offensive hints – it just seems to be the common admiring expression for a really big camera lens. 

If they ask you what you are taking photos of, you may want to answer “我拍鸟[wǒ pāi niǎo]” as “I shoot birds”. They really say “拍[pāi]”, which means not only “shoot” but also (colloquially) take photos.

Some terms for equipment seem to have their own natural logic independent of the language. Thus, the English tripod is the Chinese三脚架[sān jiǎo jià], the three-legged stand. Note how you can probably see yourself why the first character stands for the number three.

In terms of equipment, you will find that many Chinese bird photographers have very expensive gear, utilizing the same brands as Western bird photographers (mostly Canon and Nikon), though usually slightly more recent models and slightly bigger and newer lenses. There is one cultural difference here – Chinese photographers rarely use the Gimbal heads favored in the West, instead using video heads. These work just as well. Possibly this preference is because Japanese photographers also seem to prefer video heads, and they offered an initial role model. Ok, this is more about culture than about language, but kind of interesting as well.

Just as elsewhere, there are sometimes conflicts between bird photographers and those who only want to watch birds. The latter sometimes use the somewhat negative term “Uncle”, “大爷[dà yé]” to describe local photographers with huge camera lenses and dressed up as for a rescue mission with a camouflage shirt and hat. This comes from this older generation sometimes not being very careful in the environment, destroying habitat to in order to get photos, and leaving their trash everywhere. Fortunately, younger Chinese birders and bird photographers tend to be much more well-educated.

Generally, older Chinese photographers do not seem to like binoculars,望远镜[wàng yuǎn jìng]. Maybe it is because they have great eyes – but it is also a different way of bird photography. Some of them do not like to search for birds and would rather just sit and wait for them. Thus, binoculars are less necessary. Also, for these older Chinese photographers, this is more of a social activity done with friends.