Northeast · Atlantic Flyway
Are there magpies in Rhode Island?
Not as regular birds. Magpies in Rhode Island are missing from the everyday birdlife: across 2.3 million eBird records submitted in 2020–2024, no magpie species was reported at all.
Magpies are the long-tailed black-and-white members of the crow family. The Black-billed Magpie is a common bird across the West and northern Plains but essentially absent from the East, which is why so many people ask whether magpies occur in their state.
Magpies in Rhode Island: what the eBird records show
This site treats a species as regularly occurring in a state when it has at least 25 eBird records over 2020–2024 and is reported at a steady rate through at least part of the year. No magpie clears that bar in Rhode Island.
For comparison, the most-reported bird in the state, the Song Sparrow, has 74,684 records over the same period, and even scarce residents typically pass 25 within a few months. A group that stays in the tens or single digits over five years is, for practical purposes, absent.
Where magpies live, they need no encouragement: they take suet, pet food, scraps, and anything else left out. Where they do not live, no feeder will bring one.
Rhode Island birds you will see instead of magpies
The species that dominate Rhode Island eBird records over the same 2020–2024 period, for a sense of scale.
Put side by side, the gap is the whole story: the Song Sparrow alone has 74,684 Rhode Island records in 2020–2024, against 0 for every magpie species combined.
Magpies near Rhode Island: the nearest states
Among the states covered on this site, these have regular magpies, most species first:
Magpies in California — 3 regularly recorded species, led by the Yellow-billed Magpie with 55,636 eBird records.
Magpies in Colorado — 1 regularly recorded species, led by the Black-billed Magpie with 380,895 eBird records.
Magpies in Oregon — 1 regularly recorded species, led by the Black-billed Magpie with 53,927 eBird records.
Magpies in Rhode Island: FAQ
Are there magpies in Rhode Island?
Not as regular birds. Across 2.3 million eBird records from the state in 2020–2024, no magpie species was reported at all.
Where are the nearest magpies?
Among the states covered here, California (3 species, led by the Yellow-billed Magpie), Colorado (1 species, led by the Black-billed Magpie) and Oregon (1 species, led by the Black-billed Magpie).
Could I still see a magpie in Rhode Island?
It would be exceptional; any sighting should be documented with a photo and reported to eBird.
More Rhode Island birds
Magpies in Rhode Island: sources
Every number on this page comes from the EOD – eBird Observation Dataset published by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and distributed through GBIF under a CC BY 4.0 license: Rhode Island records from 2020–2024, retrieved 2026-09-18, for the families Corvidae. “Records” are individual eBird observations and reflect how often birders report a species, not a population count.