Birds

Catbird

Dumetella carolinensis · also called gray catbird, grey catbird

Least Concern → omnivoreinsectivore Temperate forest Temperate grassland

A catbird is a shy, slate-grey songbird that gives itself away with a sound no other North American bird makes quite so convincingly: a soft, nasal mew, exactly like a cat, from somewhere deep in a thicket. It is a quiet relative of the mockingbird, and it is one of the few songbirds smart enough to simply throw a cowbird’s egg out of its nest.

Overview

The gray catbird, Dumetella carolinensis, is a slim, dark grey bird of dense shrubs, thickets, and hedgerows across temperate North America. It eats insects in summer and berries through the colder months, and it belongs to the Mimidae, the mimic thrush family shared with the mockingbird and the thrashers.

A mimic that whispers

Like its relatives, the catbird weaves snippets of other birds’ songs into its own long, rambling warble, though more quietly and from deeper cover than a mockingbird. It even has a genuine “whisper song”, an intricate but barely audible version used at close range. Agitated, it cocks and flicks its tail while scolding from the bushes.

Beating the cowbird

The catbird is one of the few North American songbirds that reliably recognises and ejects a cowbird’s egg, pushing it out of the nest within a day or two — a defence most small hosts of this brood parasite never evolved.

Status

Least Concern — common and stable, comfortable in the scrubby, edge, and suburban habitat that is relatively abundant across its range.

Catbird: common questions

Why does the catbird sound like a cat?

Its signature call is a short, nasal, downward-sliding mew that closely mimics the sound of a cat, produced using the same vocal organ, the syrinx, that lets the bird also imitate other species. Unlike its mimicry of other birds, the cat-like mew appears to be one of the catbird's own natural calls rather than a copy of an actual cat, and it is used as a contact and alarm call, often the first clue that a catbird is nearby, since the bird itself usually stays hidden in dense cover.

Is the catbird a good mimic like the mockingbird?

Yes, though it is generally less flamboyant about it. As a member of the mimic thrush family alongside the mockingbird and the thrashers, the catbird readily incorporates fragments of other birds' songs, frog calls, and even mechanical sounds into its own long, rambling, warbling song, but it tends to deliver these phrases more quietly and less in the repeated, structured pattern typical of a mockingbird's song, and it often sings from deep inside a shrub rather than from an exposed perch, so its mimicry is easy to overlook even when it is extensive.

How does a catbird deal with cowbird eggs?

A catbird is unusually good, among North American songbirds, at recognising a brown-headed cowbird egg that has been slipped into its nest and simply pushing it out with its bill, typically within a day or so of it appearing, before investing further effort in incubating it. This egg-rejection behaviour is thought to have evolved because catbirds have coexisted with brood-parasitic cowbirds for a very long time, giving natural selection time to favour individuals able to spot and remove the mismatched egg, unlike many smaller or more recently exposed host species that accept cowbird eggs without resistance.

Where do catbirds go in winter?

Catbirds that breed across most of temperate North America migrate south for the winter, but generally not as far as many other songbirds, settling mainly in the southeastern United States, Mexico, Central America, and various Caribbean islands, where dense scrub and fruiting shrubs provide food through the cooler months. They tend to arrive back on the breeding grounds relatively late in spring and depart again relatively early in autumn compared with longer-distance migrants, spending a comparatively large share of the year on or near the wintering grounds.

Sources & further reading

Written by HideShark Editorial Team · reviewed by HideShark Science Desk. Published September 11, 2026. Last updated September 11, 2026.

Quick facts

Scientific name: Dumetella carolinensis
Diet: An omnivore that shifts through the year, eating ants, beetles, caterpillars, and other insects and invertebrates gleaned from shrubs and the ground in spring and summer, and switching heavily to berries and small fruit in late summer, autumn, and winter
A cat-like call: The catbird's most familiar sound is a nasal, downslurred mewing note remarkably like a cat, given from deep inside a thicket, and it is this call, more than its plain grey plumage, that gives the bird its name and usually the first sign of its presence
A relative of the mockingbird: The catbird belongs to the Mimidae, the mimic thrush family that also contains the mockingbirds and the thrashers, and like its relatives it is a skilled vocal mimic, weaving snippets of other birds' songs, frogs, and mechanical sounds into its own long, rambling, often quiet song
A whisper song: In addition to its normal loud song, a catbird sometimes sings an extended, intricate whisper song so quiet it can only be heard a few metres away, thought to be used in close encounters between a pair or between rival males rather than as a long-range territorial broadcast
A cowbird egg rejecter: The catbird is one of the relatively few North American songbirds that reliably recognises and ejects the eggs of the brown-headed cowbird, a brood parasite, pushing the foreign egg out of the nest with its bill within a day or two of it being laid, which spares it much of the harm the cowbird causes other hosts
A skulker with a defiant tail: Catbirds keep to dense shrubs, thickets, and tangled undergrowth and rarely venture into the open for long, but a bird that feels bold or agitated often cocks and flicks its long tail upward while scolding an intruder, a distinctive posture for an otherwise shy bird
A short-distance migrant: Most catbirds breed across temperate North America and migrate a comparatively modest distance to winter in the southeastern United States, Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean, arriving on the breeding grounds later and leaving earlier than many songbirds that travel farther
Range: Temperate North America from southern Canada through most of the United States, breeding in dense shrubby habitat including thickets, hedgerows, forest edge, overgrown fields, and suburban gardens with heavy cover, and wintering in the southeastern United States, Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean.
Conservation status: Least Concern → ≈ The gray catbird is common and widespread across its North American range and is assessed as Least Concern, with a large population that has remained broadly stable, helped by its comfort in scrubby, disturbed, and edge habitats, including overgrown fields, hedgerows, and suburban gardens, which are relatively abundant. It faces the usual pressures of habitat loss where dense shrub and thicket habitat is cleared or overly manicured, collisions with windows and vehicles, and predation by outdoor cats, but none of these have caused a significant decline, and the species is not a conservation priority in the wild