Bird
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Birds (class Aves) are winged, bipedal, endothermic (warm-blooded), vertebrate animals that lay eggs. There are around 10,000 living species, making them the most numerous tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Birds range in size from the 5 cm (2 in) Bee Hummingbird to the 2.7 m (8 ft 10 in) Ostrich. The fossil record indicates that birds evolved from theropod dinosaurs during the Jurassic period, around 150–200 Ma (million years ago), and the earliest known bird is the Late Jurassic Archaeopteryx, c 155–150 Ma. Most paleontologists regard birds as the only clade of dinosaurs that survived the Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction event approximately 65.5 Ma.
Modern birds are characterised by feathers, a beak with no teeth, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a lightweight but strong skeleton. All birds have forelimbs modified as wings and most can fly, with some exceptions including ratites, penguins, and a number of diverse endemic island species. Birds also have unique digestive and respiratory systems that are highly adapted for flight. Some birds, especially corvids and parrots, are among the most intelligent animal species; a number of bird species have been observed manufacturing and using tools, and many social species exhibit cultural transmission of knowledge across generations.
Many species undertake long distance annual migrations, and many more perform shorter irregular movements. Birds are social; they communicate using visual signals and through calls and songs, and participate in social behaviours including cooperative breeding and hunting, flocking, and mobbing of predators. The vast majority of bird species are socially monogamous, usually for one breeding season at a time, sometimes for years, but rarely for life. Other species have breeding systems that are polygynous ("many females") or, rarely, polyandrous ("many males"). Eggs are usually laid in a nest and incubated by the parents. Most birds have an extended period of parental care after hatching.
Many species are of economic importance, mostly as sources of food acquired through hunting or farming. Some species, particularly songbirds and parrots, are popular as pets. Other uses include the harvesting of guano (droppings) for use as a fertiliser. Birds figure prominently in all aspects of human culture from religion to poetry to popular music. About 120–130 species have become extinct as a result of human activity since the 17th century, and hundreds more before then. Currently about 1,200 species of birds are threatened with extinction by human activities, though efforts are underway to protect them.
For more information about Bird, read the full article at
Wikipedia.
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News tagged with birds
Darwin's mockingbirds DNA research may help species recovery
Nov 18, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- New research could help protect the future of a rare bird in the Galapagos Islands that was an inspiration for Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection, scientists report in a paper ...
Birds 'See' Earth's Magnetic Field
Nov 16, 2009 |
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When birds migrate over long distances -- sometimes thousands of miles -- they usually end up in exactly the same place year after year. Such accurate feats of navigation, accomplished by millions of birds ...
Peckish bird briefly downs big atom smasher
Nov 09, 2009 |
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A peckish bird briefly knocked out part of the world's biggest atom smasher by causing a chain reaction with a piece of bread, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN) said Monday.
Researcher finds forest birds 'commuting' to attract mates
Nov 06, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- An ecologist at the University of Rhode Island studying habitat use by a forest-dwelling game bird found that the birds unexpectedly exhibited what he described as "the bar scene phenomenon" ...
Tanker spills oil in San Francisco Bay
Oct 30, 2009 |
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A ruptured fuel line on a Panamanian-registered tanker released oil into San Francisco Bay before dawn on Friday, authorities said.
Dining out in an ocean of plastic: How foraging albatrosses put plastic on the menu (w/ Video)
Oct 28, 2009 |
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The North Pacific Ocean is now commonly referred to as the world's largest garbage dump with an area the size of the continental United States covered in plastic debris. The highly mobile Laysan albatross (Phoebastria im ...
First evidence for a second breeding season among migratory songbirds
Oct 26, 2009 |
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Biologists for the first time have documented a second breeding season during the annual cycle of five songbird species that spend summers in temperate North America and winters in tropical Central and South ...
Scientists nail quail mystery
Oct 23, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- A Massey biology researcher has used DNA analysis to prove quail on Tiritiri Matangi Island are Australian and not remnants of an extinct New Zealand species.
It takes two to tutor a sparrow
Oct 21, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- It may take a village to raise a child, and apparently it takes at least two adult birds to teach a young song sparrow how and what to sing.
Migratory route of Eleonora's falcon revealed for first time
Oct 16, 2009 |
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Satellite tracking has allowed a research team to uncover the mysteries of the migration of Eleanora's falcon for the first time. In total, the bird flies more than 9,500 kilometres across the African continent ...
Long feared extinct, rare bird rediscovered
Oct 13, 2009 |
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Known to science only by two specimens described in 1900, a critically endangered crow has re-emerged on a remote, mountainous Indonesian island thanks in part to a Michigan State University scientist.
Inside the First Bird, Surprising Signs of a Dinosaur
Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils
Oct 08, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- The raptor-like Archaeopteryx has long been viewed as the archetypal first bird, but new research reveals that it was actually a lot less “bird-like” than scientists had believed.
Edge detection crucial to eyesight
Oct 07, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- In a major advance in understanding how our eyesight works, Australian scientists have shown that birds' amazing flight and landing precision relies on their ability to detect edges.
Fanged frog, 162 other new species found in Mekong
Sep 25, 2009 |
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(AP) -- A gecko with leopard-like spots on its body and a fanged frog that eats birds are among 163 new species discovered last year in the Mekong River region of Southeast Asia, an environmental group said ...
Research backs legend of man-eating bird
Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils
Sep 22, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- A huge flesh-eating eagle that became extinct in New Zealand only 500 years ago was an efficient hunter that could attack prey 10 times its size, UNSW research has found, lending credibility ...
