Robot Bird

Robots are cool. Birds are cool (at least, sometimes). Let's make a Robot Bird! Also, if you need to scout, something that flies without being too conspicuous is a good choice. Though anything supposed to fly on feathered wings, of course, isn't.

Anime and Manga

 * In one of the Sakura Taisen OAVs, Kohran kitbashes a steam-powered robot bird out of handy parts in order to send a written message. It blows up as soon as it delivers the letter.

Literature

 * Guard-bird by Robert Sheckley has an attempt at complementing law enforcement with robots that, as the name implies, are birds.

Tabletop Games

 * In Warhammer 40,000 'verse Imperium produces Grapplehawks - relatively light armored cyber-constructs capable of anti-gravity assisted flight, with embedded avian brains that provide ready instincts for flight and hunt. As the name implies, they are built not just for scouting, but for retrieval as well, and typically are equipped with shocker claws to this end. As such, they are mostly used by enforcers and Bounty Hunters to capture suspects, as well as Adeptus Mechanicus Explorators to collect whatever specimen picks their interest without having to chase it or make big holes in it. Several types appear in Dark Heresy and Rogue Trader.

Video Games

 * Strider Hiryu arcade has the Robot Hawk as an Assist Character.

Web Comics

 * Gunnerkrigg Court has Tic-Tocs, whom the local robots classify as "mythical ornithonics" - they are artificial birds who usually stay away from everyone and only watch - nobody knows where they came from, what else they can do or to what purpose.