Krillion Recorded answers
1,467 recorded answers
How to approach it
Work outward from water types rather than from memory of a bird list. Take each kind of water in turn — open ocean, estuary, slow river, highland lake, marsh, flooded field, rocky shore — and ask which birds you can actually name that depend on it. Write down every candidate, even the ones you think are too obscure, because breadth is what this puzzle rewards. Then check each name for a real species behind it: a stable common name, a described range, a documented link to water. Drop anything that is only a family label or a bird you half-remember. Before submitting, keep the strangest plausible name and discard the generic one; the scoring favours precision over familiarity.
Get a hint
Start from the habitat instead of the family tree: fresh water, salt water, marsh, shoreline and riverbank each host their own set of birds, and any of them is a legitimate entry.
A little more
Within that habitat, sort candidates by how they use it — diving for fish, wading in shallows, nesting in reeds, probing mud, or simply roosting on rocks and posts at the water's edge.
One step further
Aim for a precise species name rather than a broad label, and lean toward something specialised, a bird whose whole life is spent on one kind of water body, over the first one that comes to mind.
Reveal answers 1,467
- Wandering whistling duckDeep Cut85points
- Water pipitDeep Cut85points
- Water railDeep Cut85points
- Water thick-kneeDeep Cut85points
- Water tyrantDeep Cut85points
- WatercockDeep Cut85points
- WaterthrushDeep Cut85points
- Wattled craneDeep Cut85points
- Wattled IbisDeep Cut85points
- Wattled JacanaDeep Cut85points
- Waved albatrossDeep Cut85points
- Wedge-rumped Storm PetrelDeep Cut85points
- Wedge-tailed shearwaterDeep Cut85points
- Welsh Harlequin duckDeep Cut85points
- West African Crested TernDeep Cut85points
- West Indian Whistling DuckDeep Cut85points
- West of England gooseDeep Cut85points
- Western grebeDeep Cut85points
- Western gullDeep Cut85points
- Western Reef HeronDeep Cut85points
- Western Rockhopper PenguinDeep Cut85points
- Western sandpiperDeep Cut85points
- Western swamphenDeep Cut85points
- Westland petrelDeep Cut85points
- WhimbrelDeep Cut85points
- Whiskered AukletDeep Cut85points
- Whiskered ternDeep Cut85points
- Whistling duckDeep Cut85points
- Whistling heronDeep Cut85points
- Whistling kiteDeep Cut85points
- Whistling thrushDeep Cut85points
- White TernDeep Cut85points
- White-backed duckDeep Cut85points
- White-backed night heronDeep Cut85points
- White-backed StiltDeep Cut85points
- White-banded SwallowDeep Cut85points
- White-bellied CinclodesDeep Cut85points
- White-bellied HeronDeep Cut85points
- White-bellied KingfisherDeep Cut85points
- White-bellied sea eagleDeep Cut85points
- White-bellied Storm PetrelDeep Cut85points
- White-breasted cormorantDeep Cut85points
- White-breasted waterhenDeep Cut85points
- White-browed CrakeDeep Cut85points
- White-browed WagtailDeep Cut85points
- White-capped albatrossDeep Cut85points
- White-capped dipperDeep Cut85points
- White-capped redstartDeep Cut85points
- White-cheeked PintailDeep Cut85points
- White-cheeked TernDeep Cut85points
Why these answers count
The top tier here is enormous, which tells you the reveal accepted almost anything with a genuine aquatic connection: 1451 of the 1466 recorded answers reached at least 60 points, and 1376 of them sat at 85. What separated the very top was not correctness but rarity. Only one entry, Sungrebe, reached 100 points, and it is the kind of answer most players never think of — a rare pick rather than a familiar shoreline bird. The 85-point band is packed with precise, well-documented species from every continent and every water type, from Abbott's Booby and Abdim's stork to African darter, African finfoot and African fish eagle: correct, specific, but shared by enough players to be capped below the maximum. The 74 answers at 60 points were still accepted, presumably broader or more commonly offered names. The lesson: specificity earns the base score, obscurity earns the premium.