The Largest Bird on Earth

THE LARGEST BIRD

[WRITER / PHOTOS: Sean Hind ] On Earth

Not only is Africa home to the largest land mammal on earth, The African elephant, it is also home to the largest bird on earth. The common ostrich (Struthio camelus) some of you might be more familiar with its flightless cousins the emu and the kiwi. All these birds belong to the ratite family, which is the group of flightless birds.

My very first memory of an ostrich, is me on the back of one, holding on for dear life as this massive bird raced down a dirt road. I think I must have been about seven or eight years old, we were on a family holiday in South Africa and we had visited an ostrich farm. Ostrich farms are found all over the world, and they are mainly farmed for the feathers - decorative and of course feather dusters, the skin for leather products and the meat marketed commercially, its leanness being the main selling point.

We are lucky enough to be able to see the ostrich running around in some of our national parks. They are the tallest and heaviest bird in the world and since they cannot fly they have adapted in other ways to survive on the open savanna woodlands. The ostrich can reach speeds of up to seventy kilometres per hour. This is really fast for a bird that can weigh up to hundred and thirty kilograms and stand well over two meters tall. This is where their wings become very useful, the ostrich uses its wings for steering and rapid breaking, this agility is what can help them escape predators. The main predators for ostrich are the big cats, lion, cheetah, and leopard but hyenas and wild dog could also hunt ostrich. Jackals might try and take the eggs and young ones.

Have you ever seen an ostrich egg? Wow, they are massive! Roughly twenty times the size of a chicken egg and can weigh up to well over a kilogram. You can find up to forty eggs in one nest site, not all these eggs are from one female. Ostriches are polygyny which means one alpha male and many female mates. There is normally just one alpha female and she is the one to first accept the nest that the male ostrich has made. This is normally just a scrape in the ground that he makes with the powerful claw that he has on his toe, the other females are then subordinate females. The alpha female will now make sure that her eggs are in the centre of the nest well, with the eggs of the subordinate females on the outside of the nest - this will make sure that her eggs are incubated and that the eggs on the periphery of the nest are more vulnerable to predation. The females, which are a greyish brown colour, tend to incubate the eggs during the day whereas the male with his mostly black plumage will incubate during the night. The incubation period is about 40 - 55 days. Baby ostriches have got to be one of the cutest things around, they basically resemble a hedgehog, this is possibly a predator deterrent. The young can group into creches and be under the care of two or more adults. An adult that is caring for the young may perform a distraction display, which is when it will run away from the group with wings flopping in a broken-wing display. The male is more likely to perform the distraction display than the female. Unfortunately, the survival rate is not great for the young, from bush fires destroying eggs, to jackals and hyenas eating the eggs and the great martial eagle is a potential predator for the young chicks.

Some fun facts about the Ostrich

1 - It is a myth that an ostrich buries its head in the sand, they do however walk along with their head held about 30cm above the ground feeding on plants and seeds. 2 - Ostriches have the largest eye of any land mammals, measuring 5cm across, this allows for them to see predators from far off.

3 - The ostrich is the fastest two legged creature on the planet reaching speeds of 70km/h. When running at full speed a stride can be as long as 5m. 4 - There are two species of ostrich found in Africa, the common ostrich (Struthio camelus) which are generally found in the drier parts of Africa and the Somali ostrich (Struthio molybdophanes) which is found in northeast Africa.