General Description: Loggerhead Shrikes (Lanius ludovicianus) are medium-sized birds of the desert with a light chest, gray back, black wings and tail, a black bandit mask, and a hooked bill. Shrikes fly low across the landscape (often below shrub level) with very fast, stiff wing beats.

Taxonomy: Passeriformes, Laniidae.

Favored Habitat: Desert scrub.

Where to Find: Shrikes are never common around Las Vegas, but look for them in desert scrub; Red Rock Canyon NCA and the Henderson Bird Viewing Preserve are good places to check.

Comments: Loggerhead Shrikes are also called "butcher birds" from their habit of catching everything they can find (mostly lizards, beetles, and mice), and when they are too full to eat more, they save the rest for later. They hang the extra prey items from a cactus spine or tree thorn in their "larder," where it dries out and doesn't rot before the shrike can come back to eat. If you see a lizard or grasshopper hanging from a yucca spine, you know that a shrike has been at work.

Loggerhead shrikes are declining in some parts of their range, and they are considered to be sensitive species in some areas, including Clark County.