Flightless Birds

Flightless Birds

When birds find themselves in habitats where ground – living predators are not present, they no longer have a need to fly from dangers. As a consequence, they are able to remain ground and become larger, which has other advantages. That is the general rule with flightless birds. The classic examples were the elephant birds from Madagascar and the moas from New Zealand, both now extinct due to hunting by humans. There were also the famous dodo and its relations, the solitaires. Today, the largest flightless bird is the ostrich, which is large enough to see off any predator on the African plains. Similar flightless birds include the emu, the rhea and the cassowary. All share a similar design, with robust legs for running and kiching, feathers that have become fur- like and long necks for reaching the ground. They all have similar omnivorous diets, too. Kiwis are different in having long de-curved bills for probing mud and sand for native worms and other invertebrates. They are also the only bird to have nostrils at the tip of bill, so that they can smell their food, such as earthworms, insects, fruits and berries, as they forage in the leaf litter.

Cassowary

Emu

Other flightless birds include a cormorant, a parrot, a coot and a rail. A great many flightless bird species have become extinct over the last two centuries, partly due to persecution by man, but mainly due to the introduction of predators, such as rats, cats and dogs. That is become most lived on remote islands and went about their lives unthreatened until explores arrived. Compounding the problem was the fact that island species had no instinctive fear because they had no experience of danger, so they were easy food for people and animals alike. The name of the ill- fated dodo (Raphus cucullatus), from the island of Mauritius, has, since its demise, been used to describe people of extreme stupidity such was its own complete lack of inclination to escape when being Slaughtered for food by European Sailors.

The most familiar flightless birds are the Penguin family (Spheniscidae), of which there are between 17 and 20 living species. The ancestral penguin gave up flight so that its wings could evolve into flippers, thereby enabling it to swim with supreme efficiency in the oceans to catch fish. Penguins are able to live in Places where land predators are absent, so flight is not required. In addition, they can migrate via the oceans. Their main predators are seals, orcas and sharks.