Talk:List of birds by flight speed

Add pages List of birds by flight duration and List of birds by flight length
I understand that a common swift can stay aloft for many years, and a bar-tailed Godwit's flight of over 11,500 km was measured. Tedtoal (talk) 16:15, 29 November 2013 (UTC)

Page needs to be more comprehensive
This page as it stands just duplicates the "oh my god" Yahoo Answers style list found everywhere on the web.


 * Protocol S1.

Some naturalist might wish to pick the speedier members and translate from Latin. I was trying to identify a smallish bird that transits my back yard in the blink of an eye. Found a picture of a red knot in flight (dun coloured) that exactly resembles the blur I've seen. Knots are sometimes found on southern Vancouver Island, but it could also be another type of shorebird. It jukes a few meters from side to side darting north or south at a speed I would estimate in traffic as 70 kph.

I'd like to see the chart have size, mass, and notes on distribution, down to compass points on continents (e.g. Western N.A.)

The paper providing this chart is Flight Speeds among Bird Species: Allometric and Phylogenetic Effects. &mdash; MaxEnt 14:28, 10 July 2012 (UTC)

One point unsaid here is that accipiters (woodland hawks) can easily outfly a duck as well as many other "fast" birds. Intercepting prey while in level flight requires speeds which are very much in excess of the prey. Anybody have data on this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.5.137.66 (talk) 00:03, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Upward Speed
Would it be a good idea to add a column for largest height gained speed in still air? SovalValtos (talk) 13:43, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

Backwards speed
Similar query to above.SovalValtos (talk) 13:45, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

Total Distance
There should be a section of the table detailing how far each bird can fly without stopping. Flight speed is not always relative to flight distance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.176.126.174 (talk) 19:10, 29 June 2024 (UTC)

reference
Is a single claim in this article backed up by credible research? Looks like nothing but junk science to me. --AGF

it would be great to find values that was not anecdotal
Almost all values presented here are absolutely anecdotal, especially top horizontal speeds, as well as stoops of peregrine and golden eagle. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.236.86.169 (talk) 10:33, 30 October 2015 (UTC)

Other claims to fastest
Doves are the fastest birds in horizontal flight. Acoording to , Racing Homing Pigeons have been clocked flying 92.5 mph average speed on a 400 mile race. That's AVERAGE, not top speed. A rock dove (pigeon), mourning dove, or white-winged dove can evade a falcon on the flat. It's only in its stoop (vertical drop) that a falcon has the advantage.

Please respond if you have information that contradicts this. If not, some major corrections need to be made to the chart. KC 15:36, 17 July 2016 (UTC)

There is a wikipedia article on the spine-tailed swift claiming that it can reach speeds of up to 170 km/h in horizontal flight.

NOTICE that the top speed of Pigeons in STILL AIR is about 80km/h and very exceptionally up to 96 km/h (60mph). 92.5 mph = 149km/h is with assistence of very strong tail wind. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.236.86.168 (talk) 11:46, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

KC 15:36, 17 July 2016 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Boydstra (talk • contribs)

This variant of the swift is faster: White throated needletail; perhaps it could also be added to the list. -Bow Tied69

Explanation needed of Flight column
Please explain the meaning of the Flight column. The speeds cited in this column are higher than the Maximum airspeed column. For instance Peregrine falcon Maximum airspeed is 320 km/h, but Flight is 389 km/h. I don’t understand this.Vigilfree (talk) 08:10, 18 October 2020 (UTC)