Birds of Canada (French: oiseaux du Canada) is the fifth series of banknotes of the Canadian dollar issued by the Bank of Canada and was first circulated in 1986 to replace the 1969 Scenes of Canada series. Each note features a bird indigenous to Canada in its design. The banknotes weigh 1 gram with dimensions of 152.40 by 69.85 millimetres (6.00 by 2.75 in). It was succeeded by the 2001 Canadian Journey series.

This was the first series to omit the $1 banknote; it was replaced by the $1 coin, which became known as the loonie, in 1987, although the $1 bill from the previous series would continue to be produced concurrently with the $1 coin for a 21-month long period until 1989. It was the last series to include the $2 and $1,000 banknotes. The $2 note was withdrawn in 1996 and replaced by the $2 coin now known as the toonie. The $1,000 note was withdrawn by the Bank of Canada in 2000 as part of a program to mitigate money laundering and organized crime.

The portraits on the front of the note were made larger than those of previous series. The $20, $50, $100, and $1000 banknotes had a colour-shifting metallic foil security patch on the upper left corner, an optical security device that was difficult to reproduce with the commercial reproduction equipment of the time. This was the last Canadian banknote series to include planchettes as a security feature.

This series was the first to include a bar code with the serial number. This allows the visually impaired to determine the denomination of a banknote using a hand-held device distributed by the bank of Canada for free via the Canadian National Institute for the Blind.

The Bank of Canada began preparations for design of this series in 1974. A 1981 Parliamentary committee recommending design features enabling visually impaired individuals to determine the denomination of a banknote influenced the design process for the banknotes. In 1983, the Bank of Canada chose to use "clear, uncluttered images" of Canadian birds for the reverse. This imparted on the banknotes additional security against counterfeiting, as the design had a "single, large focal point" that enabled easier detection of counterfeits compared to the complex designs of earlier banknote series.

The banknote design contains distinct colours for each denomination, and large numerals on the obverse and reverse of each denomination, both of which facilitate quick identification. A patch of about 4.75 square millimetres (0.01 sq in) width at the edge of the central banner enables blind people to determine the denomination of a banknote using an electronic device and emit an audible output to indicate it, except for the $1000 banknote. On the reverse, vertical bars adjacent to the serial number are used by banknote sorting machines for quick identification to enable high-speed sorting.

In 1984, the Bank of Canada announced that production of banknotes would be revised to require 100% cotton fibre, eliminating the 25% flax content requirement. Domestic flax producers in the Prairie provinces were upset by the change, which would result in a loss of revenue of about CA$40,000. A Bank of Canada spokesman stated the change was necessary to satisfy pollution control standards, as raw flax processing uses chemicals eventually released as effluent.

The printing process required three lithographic plates and one intaglio plate for the obverse, and three lithographic plates for the reverse.