1881 in birding and ornithology

• Birds described in 1881 include Cory's shearwater, Royal parrotfinch, Sulu pygmy woodpecker, Coppery emerald, Mexican whip-poor-will, Sepia-brown wren, Socotra warbler, Fiery-shouldered parakeet, Mrs. Hume's pheasant, Socotra golden-winged grosbeak, Blue-rumped pitta,

• Death of John Gould and Louis Hippolyte Bouteille
• Last specimens of Seychelles parakeet collected

• Philip Lutley Sclater Monograph of the Jacamars and Puff-birds.
• Philip Lutley Sclater and Gustav Hartlaub. On the Birds collected in Socotra by Prof. I. B. Balfour. Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London 1881 online
• Robert George Wardlaw-Ramsay The Ornithological works of Arthur 9th Marquis of Tweeddale (1881)
• Jean Cabanis, Anton Reichenow, Herman Schalow, Gustav Hartlaub and other Germans in Ornithologisches Centralblatt Leipzig :L.A. Kittler,1876-82. online

Ongoing events

• John Gould The birds of Asia 1850-83 7 vols. 530 plates, Artists: J. Gould, H. C. Richter, W. Hart and J. Wolf; Lithographers:H. C. Richter and W. Hart
• Henry Eeles Dresser and Richard Bowdler Sharpe A History of the Birds of Europe, Including all the Species Inhabiting the Western Palearctic Region.Taylor & Francis of Fleet Street, London
• José Vicente Barbosa du Bocage Ornithologie d'Angola. 2 volumes, 1877–1881.
• Osbert Salvin and Frederick DuCane Godman 1879–1904. Biologia Centrali-Americana . Aves
• Richard Bowdler Sharpe Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum London,1874-98.
• Jean Cabanis, Gustav Hartlaub, Otto Finsch and other members of the German Ornithologists' Society in Journal für Ornithologie online BHL
• The Ibis