Classic bird paintings

American Robin painting: Audubon's plate and other classic portraits

John James Audubon painted the American Robin as plate 131 of The Birds of America (1827–38), under the same name. A free high-resolution scan is on Audubon.org. The robin shown here is by John and Elizabeth Gould, from John Gould's The Birds of Europe (1832–37), where it is called the Migratory Ouzel.

Updated

An American Robin with a gray back and orange breast leaning forward from a broken branch above a few pale leaves
American Robin, from John Gould's The Birds of Europe, where he called it the Migratory Ouzel. John and Elizabeth Gould, The Birds of Europe (1832–37)

About this painting

This robin comes from John Gould's The Birds of Europe (1832–37), plate 74, where it goes by the name Migratory Ouzel, Merula migratoria. Gould worked with a small team of artists; our guide to John Gould tells who drew what.

Audubon’s American Robin: plate 131, “American Robin”

Audubon's plate shows a whole robin family with its nest in a chestnut oak: young birds that left the nest before they were fully feathered, hurrying to meet a parent with food.

In his text he remembered stepping ashore in Labrador, with patches of snow still on the ground. The first land bird he saw there was a robin, and when it sang, he wrote, he “could scarcely refrain from shedding tears.” Near Great Egg Harbor, New Jersey, he once found a robin's nest fixed to the timbers of an unfinished well, seven or eight feet below the ground.

Story: Audubon’s Ornithological Biography, vol. 2 (1834). See plate 131 free at Audubon.org.

More classic portraits, free to see

  • John James Audubon, The Birds of America, octavo edition (1840–44), plate 142: “American Robin, or Migratory Thrush”. Free scan (New York Public Library Digital Collections)
  • John and Elizabeth Gould, The Birds of Europe (1832–37), plate 74: “Migratory Ouzel” (Merula migratoria) (the painting shown above). Free scan (University of Kansas Libraries)
  • Louis Agassiz Fuertes, for Elon H. Eaton’s Birds of New York (1910–14), plate 106: “Robin”, with the Eastern Bluebird. Free scan (Internet Archive)

About the American Robin

  • American Robins usually look for food on lawns, running a short way and then pausing. (Source: National Audubon Society)

The oldest known wild American Robin lived at least 13 years and 11 months: it was banded in California in 1962 and found there again in 1975. That is a record from bird banding, not a typical lifespan. (Source: USGS Bird Banding Laboratory, 2025 longevity table.) How long do wild birds live?

Buying a print?

An original plate 131 is a hand-colored sheet about 26 by 38 inches, printed in Britain in 1827–38; many prints sold today are reproductions or small 1840s octavo prints. How to tell an original from a reproduction.

In a Birdfolio, the hardcover book of your own life list, this painting sits beside the American Robin with the date and place you first saw one. See your own list as a book, free.