"The American Dipper, also known by the much cooler name "water ouzel" looks like a boring, plump, dull gray bird that you could easily ignore, but look and listen and you'll learn that this bird is anything but boring. The dipper, or ouzel, thrives in cold mountain rivers and streams - in fact its our only aquatic songbird. 

In the winter, it is common on our Valley rivers, but come late spring it starts to move up in elevation and by summertime you will only find it high in the mountains, bobbing and dipping (as its name implies) with bent legs on river rocks. 

They can walk on the bottom of rivers, dive and swim underwater using their wings as fins, and fly through waterfalls. But my favorite thing about this dull gray bird is its song which is beautiful, loud and sounds like pure joy on a frigid winter day when you'd think no bird would be singing so happily"