Traditionally, April Fools' Day is a time to play pranks, share hoaxes, and tell jokes. April Fool stories published by newspapers and other media outlets may trick readers into believing tall tales -- until they realize the date. Here are some bird-themed funnies that have come out on April Fools' Days in the past.

A lot of April Fool jokes involving crazy bird stories originated from photo manipulation -- an old-fahsioned version of "photoshopping". Examples of this include a German paper exposing a penguin as tall as a man in 1931; that time in 1941 when a newspaper revealed a military plan to plant bombs on crows; and the strange and silly rare human-legged ostrich that reportedly puzzled scientists in 1953 Australia.

Google is known to reveal a prank each April Fools' Day, often involving a new product or service in their technology offering. In 2002 they introduced PigeonRank to the world, exposing the truth behind their search technology. Pigeon Clusters (PCs) were the true power Google used to rank and sort web pages. The somewhat elaborate story behind PigeonRank was shared in detail, including graphs and diagrams and a FAQ.

A popular video was released by the BBC in April Fools' Day 2008 which showed Adelie Penguins taking flight. At the time it was one of the most viewed internet videos.

A mysterious physical April Fools' Day prank was played on the town of Portage, Wisconsin in 2012. Plastic lawn geese dressed in different outfits were placed around businesses, homes, and services in the city. In all, 132 geese were found. Although the perpetrators were not made known, no one who received a goose seemed to mind. Read this extremely wholesome newspaper report on the incident.

Then there was that time when we revealed a new species of crane that was discovered in South America. We even shared a colorful Birdorable image of the new species, which we dubbed the Painted Crane (Grus pictus). This April Fool prank came out just as we were celebrating Crane Week -- it was an incredible coincidence!

Watch out for more pranks and hoaxes as you go about your day and keep in mind the date! Happy April Fools' Day!

Happy Halloween from Birdorable! Do you recognize the above birds? They're the Blue Jay, Northern Cardinal, Tufted Titmouse and Black-capped Chickadee, all common backyard birds in the United States, hanging around two carved pumpkins. If you're still looking to do something today to celebrate Halloween, before you're going out trick-or-treating tonight, you can check out these original Halloween Birdorable coloring pages with some of our favorite birds:

Here are direct links to the coloring pages:

• Halloween Scarlet Macaw and Cockatiel Coloring Page (more about the Scarlet Macaw and Cockatiel)
• Halloween Eurasian Eagle-Owl Coloring Page (more about the Eurasian Eagle-Owl)
• Halloween King Vulture Coloring Page (more about the King Vulture)
• Halloween American Kestrel Coloring Page (more about the American Kestrel)
• Halloween Barn Owl Coloring Page (more about the Barn Owl
• Halloween Indian Vulture Coloring Page (more about the Indian Vulture)
• Halloween California Condor Coloring Page (more about the California Condor)
• Halloween Tufted Titmouse Coloring Page (more about the Tufted Titmouse)

Go to coloring pages to find over 100 others to download and follow us on our Blog or on Facebook to get notified when new downloads like this are added.

Have you used our coloring pages at home, in your classroom, or at an event? We'd love to hear about it! Send us photos of the pages in action, or the final result – we may showcase them on our blog!

Today, March 14, is traditionally celebrated as Pi Day -- because when the date is written 3/14, it represents the first three significant numbers of Pi. Pie day may be celebrated by eating pie, but since we like birds, today seems like a good day to celebrate the family of birds that has pie right in the name: Magpies!

There are three groups of true magpies. The four species of magpie in the genus Pica are the Holarctic, or black-and-white, magpies. The nine species of Oriental magpie are generally blue-green and are in the Urocissa genus and the Cissa genus. The azure-winged magpie belongs in the genus Cyanopica. Here are some fun facts about this group of intelligent and curious birds.

• Magpies belong to the Corvid family, which makes them closely related to birds like jays, crows, and ravens.
• The cartoon characters Heckle and Jeckle are a pair of magpies.
• There are several collective nouns used to describe a group of magpies, including "a gulp of magpies" and "a mischief of magpies."
• Magpies aren't the only birds with "pie" in their name. Another group in the Corvid family is the treepies. One bird in this group has a confusing name: the Black Magpie of Asia.
• Another bird with a confusing name is the Australian Magpie. This species isn't a magpie at all! Although its black-and-white plumage is very magpie-like, this species belongs in a different genus and is closely related to the Butcherbirds of Australasia.
• A recent taxonomical split may have added a new species of magpie to the list. The Azure-winged Magpie has an usual fragmented range with part of the population in southwestern Europe and part over in eastern Asia. Some ornithologists consider the two populations to be separate species, naming the European bird the Iberian Magpie.
• The Javan Green Magpie is the most endangered species of magpie. Endemic to Indonesia, it is considered to be Critically Endangered by the IUCN. Other endemic species of magpie include the Sri Lanka Blue Magpie, found only in Sri Lanka, and the Yellow-billed Magpie, found only in the U.S. state of California.

We would like to wish everyone who celebrates this holiday a Happy Thanksgiving today, with this picture of our Wild Turkey accompanied by a Tufted Titmouse. May the good things in life be yours in abundance, not only at Thanksgiving but throughout the coming year.

Happy New Year and best wishes for 2013! We added almost 100 new birds on Birdorable last year, and updated many others. In the picture below you can see all the new bird species we added in 2012, from lovebirds to vultures. Click to embiggen.

Thank you for reading our blog. We have big plans for 2013 and look forward to bring you many more cute birds, so stay tuned. You can also find Birdorable on Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

Stuck inside on a cold or snowy day? Have some cute bird fun with our free Birdorable Coloring pages! We've got six holiday-themed pages plus thirteen other single-bird drawings ready for your creative coloring skills! Each of the single-bird coloring pages has some fun basic facts about the species - so you'll learn a bit about the birds as you color them in!

Have you used our coloring pages at home, in your classroom, or at an event? We’d love to hear about it! Send us photos of the pages in action, or the final result – we may showcase them on our blog!

Add Birdorable birds to your Christmas gift wrapping this year for some cute holiday cheer! Here are two fun ideas that combine our cartoon cuties with your own creativity!

Free Birdorable labels to print out and color

Print out our free downloadable PDF holiday labels. Use watercolor paint, crayons, markers, or colored pencils to color the birds. Cut out the finished birds and use tape or glue to attach them to your wrapped holiday gifts! Choose from Northern Cardinal, Tufted Titmouse, or screech owl.

Use Zazzle's tools to design your own Birdorable gift labels

Here are step-by-step instructions you can use to design personalized Birdorable gift label stickers for purchase. In this example, we'll design gift labels featuring one of our favorite birds, the Red-breasted Nuthatch. 1. Pick your bird! Visit Birdorable.com, click on Meet the Birds, and use the search box to find the Red-breasted Nuthatch species page. 2. Choose your design! Look at the Birdorable designs featuring the Red-breasted Nuthatch. For this example, we'll use Nuthatch Santa. 3. Start with a sticker! On the page featuring Nuthatch Santa apparel and gifts, find a sticker. Any sticker will do to start. Click on the square sticker to bring up the product page on Zazzle.com. 4. Customize it! Click on the orange Customize it! button to make changes to the sticker. Customization tools allow you to change things like the background color and design size and placement. The below video shows how customization works for some of these attributes.

You can make these kind of creative changes to all of our customizable stickers. So get creative and have fun! Happy holidays!

Our American friends are preparing to celebrate Thanksgiving tomorrow, which means that the holidays are just around the corner! We'd like to highlight just a few new products, popular products, and new designs that would make perfect gifts for the bird-lover on your holiday gift list.

Gifts For Owl Lovers

There's no doubt that owls are a hot design trend this year. Cute cartoon owls are especially popular. There are a lot of pastel or brightly colored owls on the market, but here at Birdorable we pride ourselves on designing cartoon birds that are totally cute and naturally accurate - though we aren't against adding a little whimsy to our designs. Case-in-point: our most popular seller this year has been Owls are Cool, which features a Birdorable Barred Owl wearing a cool pair of shades. Have a look at all of our cute owl gifts.

For Your Holiday Gift Exchange: Shop by Price

We have improved the shop-by-price function on Birdorable.com. In the upper left corner there is a handy box which lists gift recipients and gift price ranges. If you click on one of the price range links, you can see a list of all products within that range. The new functionality allows for searching for specific products and/or birds within a price range. For example, you can search for Barn Owl t-shirts priced between $25 and $35, Christmas ornaments priced $15 to $20, or Bald Eagle gifts from $7 to $13.

Fun Ideas for Backyard Birders

If you have someone on your list who loves feeding birds, let them show off their hobby with a cute t-shirt! We've got designs for sharing Backyard Bird love plus a special design for those across the pond who feed their garden birds. If your recipient has a special favorite bird, browse through our species pages to find the perfect gift!

Think Green with Sustainable Gifts

Promote conservation at home with reuseable water bottles and cloth grocery and tote bags.

NEW! Smartphone Cases for Everyone

We have cases for iPhone 5 cases; iPhone 4 cases; iPhone 3 cases; Droid RAZR phone cases; HTC Vivid cases; Samsung Galaxy S3 cases; Samsung Galaxy S2 cases; and Blackberry cases. Some of these cases are brand new in our shop and have not been added with all of our designs so far. If there is a case you want with a certain design, let us know and we'll add it as soon as we can!

Pictured: One Day I'm Going To Be The Pope! iPhone 3 case; Philippine Eagle HTC Vivid case; Four Color Warblers Blackberry case; Puffin Prowess iPhone 4 case; Leach's Storm Petrel iPhone 5 case We've got accessories for other electronic devices, too. Check out our growing collection of iPad cases & folios; iPod Touch cases; iPad mini cases; and Kindle Keyboard cases We've also got new apparel options, plus brand new birds will be added each week right up until the end of the year. We're really gearing up for Christmas! As you prepare for the coming season, we wish you and all of our Birdorable fans tranquility, peace, and love during this season, and all throughout the year.

Today is Penguin Awareness Day! This commemorative day is always celebrated on January 20th, though the origins of the holiday are unclear. What is very clear is that these special charismatic birds deserve celebration! Many of the world's penguin species face population threats from habitat loss and other environmental strains.

Here are some resources for learning more about penguins:

• Nature: The World of Penguins
• Penguin Research Projects
• Wikipedia: Penguin

To get your mind on these flightless black-and-white beauties, we are debuting a new fun puzzle series here at Birdorable. Let's play Which one doesn't belong?

The birds in the image below have a lot in common, but one of them doesn't really belong. Can you pick out the species of penguin that doesn't go with the others, and tell us what the others have in common? Visit the meet page if you need help identifying the birds and finding out which one doesn't belong.

We end the year with a special message from all birds that we added this year:

(Click image to embiggen)

Do you recognize all the birds in the picture? They are (from top-left): Roseate Spoonbill, Red Knot, Northern Goshawk, Common Gallinule, Black Swan, Sardinian Warbler, Carolina Parakeet, Lesser Black-backed Gull, Humboldt Penguin, Pileated Woodpecker, Southern Cassowary, Eurasian Curlew, Eastern Screech Owl, Cinereous Vulture , Australian Ringneck, Bobolink, Lilac-breasted Roller, Brant Goose, Shoebill, Eurasian Spoonbill, European Roller, Chimney Swift, Chinstrap Penguin, Common Moorhen, Swainson's Trush, Little Egret, Lammergeier, Hermit Thrush, Pink-footed Goose, Lord Derby's Parakeet, Northern Bobwhite, Gray-cheeked Thrush, Great Black-backed Gull, Northern Wheatear, Blackburnian Warbler, Roadside Hawk, Dickcissel, Cyprus Warbler, Blue-bellied Roller, Double-barred Finch and Spoon-billed Sandpiper.