This area is for interesting bird facts. You never know you might learn something you did not know!!
- According to the BBC, the oldest parrot on record is a Blue and Gold Macaw named Charlie. Charlie is reported to have been owned by Winston Churchill, and is believed to be 104 years of age.
- There are over 350 species of parrots in the world.
- The smallest parrot species are the Pygmy Parrots, who average at about 8cm in length.
- The largest of the parrot species is the Hyacinth Macaw, which can grow to a length of about 40 inches from the beak to the end of the tailfeathers.
- At any given time, there are anywhere between one and two billion living birds on the planet.
- The only species of parrot that builds a nest is the Quaker Parrot. The Quakers link their nests together to form structures akin to "bird condominiums". These nests can reach weights greater than 200 lbs.
- The most common bird on the planet is the Chicken.
- Based on similarities in skeletal structure, a good number of scientists have theorized that many modern bird species evolved from the dinosaurs.
- Female Lovebirds often amuse their owners by shredding up the paper lining on their cage and placing the strips between their tailfeathers. This is an instinctual behavior that would allow the bird to carry materials back to her nesting site for construction.
- Migratory bird species fly in formation to conserve energy -- much like driving in a larger vehicle's slipstream can reduce the amount of gas you require.
- There are over 40 million pet birds living in the U.S.
- Some parrot species must fly over 500 miles a day in the wild to forage for food.
- Birds have a reduced sense of taste as compared to other animals, and science has yet to definitively prove that all bird species have a sense of smell.
- A bird's feathers weigh more than its skeleton does.
- The shape of a bird's beak directly corresponds to the type of diet it eats in the wild.
- The oldest bird was known as an Archaeopteryx and lived about 150 million years ago. It was the size of a raven, was covered with feathers, and had wings.
- The most yolks ever found in a single chicken's egg is nine.
- An ostrich egg needs to be boiled for 2 hours to get a hard-boiled egg. An ostrich's eye is larger than its brain.
- The Royal Albatross' eggs take 79 days to hatch
- The egg of the hummingbird is the world's smallest bird's egg; the egg of the ostrich, the world's largest.
- The now-extinct elephant bird of Madagascar laid an egg that weighed 27 pounds.
- Precocial birds like chickens, ostriches, ducks, and seagulls hatch ready to move around. They come from eggs with bigger yolks than altricial birds like owls, woodpeckers, and most small songbirds that need a lot of care from parents in order to survive.
- Air sacs may make up 1/5 of the body volume of a bird.
- A bird's normal body temperature is usually 7-8 degrees hotter than a human's. Up to three-quarters of the air a bird breathes is used just for cooling down since they are unable to sweat.
- A bird's heart beats 400 times per minute while resting and up to 1000 beats per minute while flying.
- The world's only wingless bird is the kiwi of New Zealand. They also lay the largest eggs relative to their body size of any bird in the world.
- Migrating ducks and geese often fly in V-shape formations. Each bird flies in the upwash of its neighbor's beating wings and this extra bit of supporting wind increases lift, thereby saving energy.
- Falcons can swoop at over 200 mph.
- Penguins, ostriches, and dodo birds are all birds that do not fly.
- Hummingbirds eat about every ten minutes, slurping down twice their body weight in nectar every day.
- The homing pigeon, Cher Ami, lost an eye and a leg while carrying a message in World War I. Cher Ami won the Distinguished Service Cross. Its leg was replaced with a wooden leg.
- The only known poisonous bird in the world is the hooded pitohui of Papua, New Guinea. The poison is found in its skin and feathers.
- The American turkey vulture helps human engineers detect cracked or broken underground fuel pipes. The leaking fuel smells like vulture food (they eat carrion), and the clustered birds show repair people where the lines need fixing.
- Hummingbirds can fly backwards.