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Ostriches
With five sub species, the Ostrich is the world's largest living bird. Its long neck and heavily feathered body make it easily recognizable. Once only seen in Africa, they are now grown in captivity in over 50 countries. The Ostrich belongs to the Ratite family, which literally means flightless. Browse around this category to learn more about them.
749 Questions
A group of ostrich are called?
Groups of ostriches are called herds or flocks. Ostriches generally wander around in groups of five or less, they are considered nomadic.
What animal that lays a hundreds of eggs?
It varies according to the species. Some species only lay a single egg. Others lay up to 30. Even within some species there can be considerable variation - for example, Testudo hermanni boettgeri (the eastern or balkan Hermann's tortoise) usually lays between 6-10 eggs. By comparison, Testudo hermanni hermanni (the western Hermann's tortoise) typically only lays 3 eggs per clutch. On average, most Mediterranean tortoises lay 5 or 6 eggs per clutch, and many are capable of laying 2 or more clutches per season.
An ostrich is unable to fly, but it has two long, every strong legs on which it can run fast on.
The ostrich is native to Africa (and it used to be native to the Middle East). A link is provided to the Wikipedia article on this, the largest of the living birds.
Big cats such as lions, leopards, and cheetahs, hyenas, and wild dogs. As many as 85% of young ostriches are killed before they reach the age of one year. The surviving adult birds can live for 40 years or more.
How much does a pet ostrich cost?
On average, the cost of an ostrich is strikingly comparable to the cost of the rare giant donkey. In the United States it is moderately more expensive due to the strict ostrich immigration laws in place throughout the Mexican border. However, baby ostriches can often be purchased for about 100 dollars as long as they are young. But a full grown ostrich will cost about 10000 dollars.
What are characteristics of an ostrich?
- strong long legs to move quickly
- long necks to reach food and water easily (i think)
- beak to help it take food (i think)
- large size to be able to defend against other predators
How do ostriches protect themselves?
The ostrich isn't such a bright bird. The only basic things that they know how to do well are: to eat, to drink, to bite, to dig their heads into the ground, to kick and to run away. So out of these the best to fit would be to kick, to bite or to run away.
What is an ostriches appearance?
They are known to be the world's largest bird. With a height of 8 to 9 feet, and a weight of 140 to 230 pounds. Their eyes are the largest of any living vertebrate. They are a grayish blackish color. They have two toes and claws on their wings. They have long legs and necks.
Yes, Ostriches don't have teeth, so they eat stones and store them in their second stomach (a.k.a. gizzard) to grind up their food for them.
What do you call a group of ostriches?
They were called "dodos" as a reference to their slow, awkward, and unhurried movement. They also lacked a fear of humans or animals, a response to the dearth of predators in their natural environment.
(The name may be from Dutch dodoor, sluggard, or dodaars, fat-arsed)
The species died out quickly, less than 80 years after their discovery, before enough generations would have adopted a quick "fleeing" response that protects other bird species.
What is the difference between a turkey and an ostrich?
No. Emus and ostriches are different in the following ways:
- Emus are endemic to Australia (meaning they are found exclusively in Australia), whilst ostriches are found in Africa.
- Emus have darker colouring, with dark brown, gery and black fine feathers. Ostriches have thicker and lighter plumage.
- An ostrich is bigger than an emu. An emu weighs between 66 and 99 pounds (30-45kg). An ostrich weighs about 300 pounds.
- The ostrich is faster and is, in fact, the world's fastest two-legged animal. An ostrich can sprint at 65 Kilometres per hour (40 miles per hour) and an emu can sprint at 50 kph, or 30 mph.
- Ostriches are unusual among the ratites (flightless birds) as they have only two toes on each foot. Emus and other ratites have three toes.
Does an ostrich have a gizzard?
No. Platypuses are mammals, and mammals do not have gizzards. In the case of the platypus, the food is broken down by the platypus's grinding plates in its jaw.
How many eggs does a ostrich lay a day?
An ostrich eats about 8 pounds of food per day. They also require small quantities of water.
Where do ostriches get their water sources?
Some ostriches have been observed living on islands, but a lot of them live in Africa in more desert-like areas.
Claimed top speeds of 60 mph (97 km/hr) have been suggested. But typical ostriches top out at 43 mph (70 km/hr) and the sustained speed is around 31 mph (50 km/hr).
An ostrich can run up to 35 miles (56.3 kilometers) per hour with its powerful legs. But horses are the better animal
When a male ostrich is ready to mate he will swell up his neck and make a noise that only a female ready to mate as well will respond to. He will then get down on his knees open his wings and swing them back and forth while his neck is still bulged. Which then the male and female will mate, the hen will lay eggs and have chicks.
What is the difference between an ostrich and an eagle?
Well one diffrence is that penguins live in antartica and an ostrich lives in africa.
There are 7 families of flightless birds in total. They include the Kiwi, Cassowaries, Rheas, Ostriches, Tinamous, Emus and Penguins.
There are also numerous flightless birds within other groups of birds which are mostly made up of species which can fly. Rails, for example, include waterfowl such as moorhens, swamp hens and other small to medium birds which can fly but prefer not to. They cannot fly for any great distance, and within the rail family, there are numerous flightless birds, such as the Takahē and the weka of New Zealand, and the Inaccessible Island rail.
Other bird families have some members which cannot fly, even though most of the family can. The kakapo, which lives in New Zealand, is the world's only flightless parrot. The flightless steamer duck of the Falkland Islands is another bird which is an anomaly with its family. The Giant Coot of South America is unusual, as the adult cannot fly, but the young birds can.
There are many more species of flightless birds. See the related link for a more complete list.
Extinct birds which could not fly include the Moa, dodo, elephant bird and Terror bird.
