Animal Corner

Discover the many amazing animals that live on our planet.

Bird Facts

Remarkable Facts About Birds

Discover which species of bird have features or behaviours that exceed other birds. Find out some amazing physical features such as what bird has the longest beak, widest tail and longest legs. Which birds are the highest flyers and deepest divers plus many more remarkable bird facts.

Physical Bird Facts

Smallest Bird Facts

  • Smallest bird: Bee Hummingbird – 5.7 centimetres (2.24 inches). Weight 1.6 g (0.056 ounces).
  • Smallest flightless bird: Island rail – 12.5 centimetres (5 inches). Weight 34.7 g (1.2 ounces).
  • Smallest hearts relative to body size: Central and South American Tinamous – 1.6 – 3. 1 % of body weight.

Largest Bird Facts

  • Largest bird: Ostrich – 2.7 metres (9 feet). Weight 63 – 130 kilograms (140 – 290 pounds).
  • Largest eyeball: ostrich with a diameter of 5 centimetres (2 inches).
  • Largest and fleshiest tongue: Flamingo.

Longest Bird Facts

  • Longest legs: Ostrich. Longest legs relative to body length: Black-winged Stilt at 23 centimetres (9 inches) or 60% of its height.
  • Longest feathers: Onagadori, a domestic strain of red jungle fowl – 10.59 metres (34.75 feet).
  • Longest tailfeathers: Crested Argus Pheasant – 173 centimetres (5.7 feet).
  • Longest tail coverts: Indian and Green Peafowl – 160 centimetres (5.24 feet).
  • Longest tail feathers relative to body length: Fork-tailed Flycatcher – 27 centimetres (10.75 inches).
  • Longest primary feathers relative to body length: Permant-winged Nightjar – 60 centimetres (2 feet).
  • Longest bill: Australian Pelican at 47 centimetres (18.5 inches).
  • Longest bill relative to body length: Swordtailed Hummingbird at 10.5 centimetres (4.13 inches).
  • Longest toes relative to body length: Northern Jacana at 10 centimetres (4 inches).
  • Longest tongue relative to body size: Wryneck at 2/3 of its body length excluding the tail.

Heaviest Bird Facts

  • Heaviest flying birth: Great Bustard – maximum 21 kilograms (46.3 pounds).

Shortest Bird Facts

  • Shortest tails: virtually non-existent in kiwis, emus, rheas, cassowaries.
  • Shortest legs: virtually non-existent in swifts (Apodidae).
  • Shortest bill: Glossy Swiftlet – few millimetres.

Mostest Bird Facts

  • Most secondary flight feathers: Wandering and Royal Albatrosses – 40 secondary feathers and 11 primary feathers on each wing.

Greatest Bird Facts

  • Greatest wingspan: Wandering Albatross – 3.63 metres (11 feet 11 inches).
  • Greatest wingspan (landbirds): Andean Condor and Marabou Stork – 3.2 metres (10.5 feet).
  • Greatest number of feathers: Whistling Swan – 25,216.

Widest Bird Facts

  • Widest tail feathers: Crested Argus Pheasant – 13 centimetres (5.1 inches).

Lowest Bird Facts

  • Lowest number of feathers: Ruby-throated Hummingbird – 940.

Keenest Bird Facts

  • Keenest sense of smell: kiwis
  • Keenest sense of hearing: Barn Owl
  • Keenest eyesight: Diurnal raptors with 1 million cones per square millimetre in the retinal fovea (a small ellipse-shaped depression in the central region of the retina somewhat less than a degree of visual angle in maximum diameter and characterized by the sharpest cone vision. The fovea centralis is the normal centre for visual fixation and attention).

Bestest Bird Facts

  • Best light-gathering capacity at night: Owls, for example the Tawny Owl.

Behavioural and Other Bird Facts

Largest Bird Facts

  • Largest recorded nesting bird colony: Passenger Pigeon – 136 million nesting in an area in Wisconsin covering 1,942 square kilometres (750 square miles).
  • Largest ground nest: Dusky Scrubfowl nest – 11 metres (36 feet) wide and 4.9 metres (16 feet) high with over 2,700 kilograms (300 tons) of forest floor litter.
  • Largest tree nest: Bald Eagle in Florida – 6.1 metres (20 feet) deep, 2.9 metres (9.5 feet) wide, and weighing 2,722 kilograms (almost 3 tons).
  • Largest social nest: African Social Weavers with a 100 chamber nest structure 8.2 metres (27 feet) in length and 1.8 metres (6 feet) in height.
  • Largest roofed nest: Hamerkop – 2 metres (6.5 feet) wide and 2 metres (6.5 feet) deep. 50 kilograms in weight.
  • Largest egg: Ostrich measuring 17.8 (7 inches) in height and 14 centimetres (4.5 inches) in width.
  • Largest egg laid by a passerine: Australian lyrebirds – 57 grams (2 ounces).
  • Largest egg laid relative to body weight: Little Spotted Kiwi – 26%.
  • Largest collection of bird skins: British Museum of Natural History with 1.25 million.
  • Largest clutch laid by a nidicolous species (birds which build substantial nests in well hidden or inaccessible places): 19 eggs laid by a European Blue Tit.
  • Largest clutch laid by a nidifugous species (those that leave the nest shortly after hatching or birth): 28 by a Bobwhite Quail.
  • Largest average clutch size: Grey Partridge – 15 – 19.
  • Largest domesticated bird: Ostrich.

Fastest Bird Facts

  • Fastest moving bird: Diving Peregrine Falcon – 188 kilometres per hour (117 miles per hour).
  • Fastest-moving racing pigeon: 177 kilometres per hour (110 miles per hour).
  • Fastest flapping bird in flight: White-throated Needle-tailed Swift at 170 kilometres per hour (106 miles per hour).
  • Fastest wingbeat: Hummingbirds – Amethyst Woodstar and Horned Sungem – 90/sec.
  • Fastest level flight: Red-breasted Merganser at 161 kilometres per hour (100 miles per hour).
  • Fastest running bird: Ostrich – 97.5 kilometres per hour (60 miles per hour).
  • Fastest running flying bird: Greater Roadrunner – 42 kilometres per hour (26 miles per hour).
  • Fastest underwater swimming bird: Gentoo Penguin – 36 kilometres per hour (22.3 miles per hour).
  • Fastest to breeding maturity: Common Quail – 5 weeks.

Highest Bird Facts

  • Highest flying bird: Ruppell’s Griffon vulture – 11,000 metres (36,100 feet) above sea level.
  • Highest daily frequency of pecking: 12,000 times by Black Woodpecker.
  • Highest tree nest: Marbled Murrelet – 45 metres (148 feet).
  • Highest price paid for a bird book: $3.96 million (U.S.) for a set of John James Audubon’s ‘The Birds of America’ in 1989.
  • Highest price paid for a mounted bird: £9,000 for an extinct Great Auk by the Natural History Museum of Iceland on 1971.
  • Highest price paid for a live bird: £41,000 for a Racing Pigeon named Peter Pau in 1986.
  • Highest price paid for a cage bird: £5,000 for a Hyacinth Macaw.
  • Highest price paid for an egg: £1,000 for an egg of extinct Aepyornis Maximus.

Lowest Bird Facts

  • Lowest altitude for nesting: Little Green Beeeater – 400 metres (1,307 feet) below sea level in the Dead Sea.

Deepest Bird Facts

  • Deepest dive for non-flying bird: Emperor Penguin – 540 metres (1,772 feet).
  • Deepest dive for a flying bird: Thick-billed Murre – 210 metres (689 feet).
  • Deepest dive for a flying bird under 210 g: Peruvian Diving Petrel – 83 metres (272 feet).

Longest Bird Facts

  • Longest soaring birds: Albatrosses and Condors.
  • Longest 2 way migration: Arctic Tern – 40,200 kilometres (25,000 miles).
  • Longest migration (coastal route): Common Tern – 26,000 kilometres (16,210 miles) in January 1997.
  • Longest submerged bird: Emperor Penguin – 18 minutes.
  • Longest fasting period: male Emperor Penguins – 134 days for incubating.
  • Longest nest burrow: Rhinoceros Auklet – 8 metres (26 feet).
  • Longest interval between eggs laid: Maleo – 1012 day intervals.
  • Longest uninterrupted incubation period: Emperor Penguin – 64 – 67 days.
  • Longest interrupted incubation period: Wandering Albatross and Brown Kiwi – 85 days.
  • Longest incubation period by a passerine species: Australian Lyrebird – 50 days.
  • Longest fledging period of flying birds: Wandering Albatross – 278 days.
  • Longest lived wild bird: Royal Albatross – over 58 years.
  • Longest lived captive bird: Sulfur-crested Cockatoo – over 80 years.

Greatest Bird Facts

  • Greatest G-force (acceleration due to gravity): Red-headed Woodpecker, its beak hitting bark at 20.9 kilometres per hour (13 miles per hour).
  • Greatest weight carrying capacity: Bald Eagle lifting a 6.8 kilograms (15 pounds) a mule deer.
  • Greatest hibernating bird: Poorwill with body temperature lowered to 18 – 20 degrees Celsius (64.4 – 68 degrees Fahrenheit).
  • Greatest bird mimic: Marsh Warbler with up to 84 songs.
  • Greatest number of sperm storage tubules: Turkey at 20,000.
  • Greatest longevity of sperm inside a female: Turkey at 42 days.
  • Greatest number of eggs laid consecutively: Mallard – 146.
  • Greatest number of broods raised in one year: Zebra Finch – 21.

Heaviest Bird Facts

  • Heaviest domestic Turkey: 37 kilograms (81 pounds).

Mostest Bird Facts

  • Most aerial bird: Sooty Terns – 3 to 10 years without landing.
  • Most aerial landbird: Common Swift – 3 years without landing.
  • Most aquatic birds: Penguins – spending 75% of their lives in the sea.
  • Most intelligent birds: African Grey Parrots, Crows, Green and Striated Herons.
  • Most talkative bird: African grey Parrot with a vocabulary of 800 words.
  • Most use of echolocation: Cave Swiftlets and Oilbirds.
  • Most abundant bird: Red-billed Quelea – up to 10 billion individuals.
  • Most songs Sung per unit time: Red-eyed Vireo – 22,197 in 10 hours.
  • Most northerly nesting bird: Ivory Gull – edge of pack ice in Arctic Circle.
  • Most valuable bird: 8 billion domestic chickens produce 562 billion eggs yearly.
  • Most valuable nest: Grey-rumped Swiftlet – bird’s nest soup.

Smallest Bird Facts

  • Smallest soaring bird: Swift.
  • Smallest nest: Cuban Bee and Vervain Hummingbirds – 1.98 centimetres (0.78 inches) in width and 1.98 – 3.0 centimetres (0.78 – 1.2 inches) deep.
  • Smallest egg laid relative to body weight: Ostrich egg – 1.5%.
  • Smallest egg: West Indian Vervain Hummingbird – 10 millimetres (0.39 inches) in length and 0.375 grams (0.0132 ounces) in weight.
  • Smallest clutch size: Albatross – 1 egg laid every 2 years.

Shortest Bird Facts

  • Shortest incubation period: Small Passerines – 11 days.

Slowest Bird Facts

  • Slowest flying bird: American Woodcock – 8 kilometres per hour (5 miles per hour).
  • Slowest wingbeat: Vultures at 1/second.
  • Slowest to breeding maturity: Royal and Wandering Albatross – 6 – 10 years.

Coldest Bird Facts

  • Coldest temperature regularly endured by a bird: Emperor Penguins – average temperatures of minus 45.6 degrees Celsius (minus 50 degrees Fahrenheit).
  • Coldest temperature endured by a bird: minus 62.5 degrees Celsius (minus 80.5 degrees Fahrenheit) by Snowy Owl.
  • Coldest temperature of land where a bird has been recorded: South Polar Skua – minus 89.6 degrees Celsius (minus 129 degrees Fahrenheit) in Vostok, Russia.

Warmest Bird Facts

  • Warmest temperature regularly endured by a bird: Larks and Wheatears at 44 – 45 degrees Celsius (111 – 113 degrees Fahrenheit).

Roundest Bird Facts

  • Roundest eggs: Owls, Tinamous.

Foulest Bird Facts

  • Foulest smelling nest: Eurasian Hoopoe.

Earliest Bird Facts

Rarest Bird Facts

  • Rarest bird in the world: Ivory-billed Woodpecker (Campephilus principalis) one of the largest woodpeckers in the world.

Country Bird Facts

  • Country with the most endangered birds: Indonesia with 126 (Brazil second with 121).
  • Country with the highest percentage of its bird species endangered: New Zealand with 30%.
  • Country with the most introduced species: United States (Hawaii) with 68.

Extinct Bird Facts

  • Largest extinct bird: Dromornis Stirtoni of Australia – 454 kilograms (1,000 pounds) and 3 metres (10 feet).
  • Tallest extinct bird: Giant Moa of New Zealand at 3.7 metres (12 feet).
  • Most recent species of bird to be declared extinct: Flightless Atitlan Grebe of Guatemala in 1984.
  • Most recent North American bird to be declared extinct. Dusky Seaside Sparrow Sparrow, in 1987.