The title of the record came from Haley's 21st Birthday, a sixth-season episode of Modern Family where two of the characters briefly debated getting matching bird and rifle tattoos.

[3] Timothy Monger at AllMusic awarded the album four out of five stars and deemed it "another extremely strong effort for Lori McKenna, whose growing catalogue is already known for its quality.

"[7] Ann Powers at NPR Music called The Bird and The Rifle "one of 2016's best releases", in part, due to "Humble and Kind", which manages to be "both widely resonant and specific".

[9] Similarly, Jon Pareles of The New York Times also praised McKenna's voice as a "taut, lived in soprano that can take on a flutter or a rasp close to the country of earlier generations" and pointing out that the strength in her songwriting is the "mundane yet illuminating detail.

[23] Furthermore, McKenna is the only woman to win the CMA award back-to-back for different songs (following 2015's Girl Crush) and only the fourth songwriter overall to do so (after Paul Overstreet, Don Schlitz and Vince Gill).