Thunderbird and giant bird sightings map

This category collects reports of unusually large birds, including accounts that use the name Thunderbird. "Thunderbird" is also a figure in the traditions of some Indigenous peoples; this page is only about modern sighting reports that use the word, which are a separate thing.

Other names in the sources: Giant bird, Big bird.

We map claims, not creatures. A case is what some source says someone saw or heard, with the link to that source. It is not proof that anything was there, and a retelling counts once, not as a second sighting.

See Thunderbird on the map All 58 cases

By the numbers

58 cases on the map, 11 of them first-hand (the witness telling it). A case may stand on several documents; copies and reprints are not confirmations.

Best-documented cases

Ranked by independent sources first, then documents, then first-hand accounts. This says how well a claim is documented, not whether it is true.

1. 

   Thunderbird · Glacier National Park, Montana · 1927

   Glacier National Park, Montana1 independent source

   The text reports that Piegan Indians believed Chief Mountain was the home of a Thunder Bird which caused thunder and lightning.

2. 

   Thunderbird · Tombstone, Arizona · 1900

   Tombstone, Arizona1 independent source

   [name] reports two prospectors shot and carried a bird into Tombstone which was nailed to a wall.

3. 

   Thunderbird · Lexington, Kentucky · 2023

   Lexington, Kentucky1 independent source

   Witness reports seeing a massive black bird with a 16-17 foot wingspan take off from his field in Kentucky.

4. 

   Thunderbird · Coudersport, Pennsylvania · 1940

   Coudersport, Pennsylvania1 independent source

   [name] claims to have witnessed a huge bird on the ground near Coudersport in 1940 that was brownish, upright, and had a wingspread of 25 feet.

5. 

   Thunderbird · Houston, Texas · 2026

   Houston, Texas1 independent source

   The narrator reports seeing an enormous bird with a wingspan the size of a school bus flying ahead of a storm while driving on Highway 3 in southeastern Houston.

6. 

   Thunderbird · Oregon

   Oregon1 independent source

   Witness reports seeing a large black bird with a 25-30 foot wingspan flying above a hill while driving in Oregon.

Further reading

• On the Track of Unknown Animals, Bernard Heuvelmans (1959)
  The founding work of cryptozoology.
  Borrow on Internet Archive
• Cryptozoology A to Z, Loren Coleman and Jerome Clark (1999)
  Encyclopedia of reported creatures.
  Borrow on Internet Archive
• Abominable Science!, Daniel Loxton and Donald Prothero (2013)
  Skeptical history of the Yeti, Nessie and others.
  Borrow on Internet Archive
• In Search of Prehistoric Survivors, Karl Shuker (1995)
  Borrow on Internet Archive

Books we have not reproduced: borrow them free at archive.org. Listing a book is not an endorsement of its claims.