Concept
Bird anatomy
Related concepts (17)
Columbidae
Columbidae (kəˈlʌmbᵻdiː) is a bird family consisting of doves and pigeons. It is the only family in the order Columbiformes. These are stout-bodied birds with short necks and short slender bills that in some species feature fleshy ceres. They primarily feed on seeds, fruits, and plants. The family occurs worldwide, but the greatest variety is in the Indomalayan and Australasian realms. The family contains 344 species divided into 50 genera. Thirteen of the species are extinct.
Origin of birds
The scientific question of within which larger group of animals birds evolved has traditionally been called the "origin of birds". The present scientific consensus is that birds are a group of maniraptoran theropod dinosaurs that originated during the Mesozoic Era. A close relationship between birds and dinosaurs was first proposed in the nineteenth century after the discovery of the primitive bird Archaeopteryx in Germany. Birds and extinct non-avian dinosaurs share many unique skeletal traits.
Flight feather
Flight feathers (Pennae volatus) are the long, stiff, asymmetrically shaped, but symmetrically paired pennaceous feathers on the wings or tail of a bird; those on the wings are called remiges ('rɛmᵻdʒiːz), singular remex ('riːmɛks), while those on the tail are called rectrices (rɛk'traɪsiːs), singular rectrix ('rɛktrɪks). The primary function of the flight feathers is to aid in the generation of both thrust and lift, thereby enabling flight.
Common ostrich
The common ostrich (Struthio camelus), or simply ostrich, is a species of flightless bird native to certain large areas of Africa. It is one of two extant species of ostriches, the only living members of the genus Struthio in the ratite order of birds. The other is the Somali ostrich (Struthio molybdophanes), which was recognized as a distinct species by BirdLife International in 2014 having been previously considered a distinctive subspecies of ostrich. The common ostrich belongs to the order Struthioniformes.
Flightless bird
Flightless birds are birds that, through evolution, lost the ability to fly. There are over 60 extant species, including the well-known ratites (ostriches, emu, cassowaries, rheas, and kiwi) and penguins. The smallest flightless bird is the Inaccessible Island rail (length 12.5 cm, weight 34.7 g). The largest (both heaviest and tallest) flightless bird, which is also the largest living bird in general, is the ostrich (2.7 m, 156 kg).
Bird flight
Bird flight is the primary mode of locomotion used by most bird species in which birds take off and fly. Flight assists birds with feeding, breeding, avoiding predators, and migrating. Bird flight is one of the most complex forms of locomotion in the animal kingdom. Each facet of this type of motion, including hovering, taking off, and landing, involves many complex movements. As different bird species adapted over millions of years through evolution for specific environments, prey, predators, and other needs, they developed specializations in their wings, and acquired different forms of flight.
Beak
The beak, bill, or rostrum is an external anatomical structure found mostly in birds, but also in turtles, non-avian dinosaurs and a few mammals. A beak is used for eating, preening, manipulating objects, killing prey, fighting, probing for food, courtship, and feeding young. The terms beak and rostrum are also used to refer to a similar mouth part in some ornithischians, pterosaurs, cetaceans, dicynodonts, anuran tadpoles, monotremes (i.e. echidnas and platypuses, which have a beak-like structure), sirens, pufferfish, billfishes and cephalopods.
Hummingbird
Hummingbirds are birds native to the Americas and comprise the biological family Trochilidae. With about 366 species and 113 genera, they occur from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, but most species are found in Central and South America. About 28 hummingbird species are listed as endangered or critically endangered, with numerous species declining in population. Hummingbirds have varied specialized characteristics to enable rapid, maneuverable flight, exceptional metabolic capacity, adaptations to high altitude, sensitive visual and communication abilities, and long-distance migration in some species.
Gas exchange
Gas exchange is the physical process by which gases move passively by diffusion across a surface. For example, this surface might be the air/water interface of a water body, the surface of a gas bubble in a liquid, a gas-permeable membrane, or a biological membrane that forms the boundary between an organism and its extracellular environment. Gases are constantly consumed and produced by cellular and metabolic reactions in most living things, so an efficient system for gas exchange between, ultimately, the interior of the cell(s) and the external environment is required.
Archosaur
Archosauria (ruling reptiles) is a clade of diapsids, with birds and crocodilians as the only living representatives. Archosaurs ˈɑːrkəˌsɔːr are broadly classified as reptiles, in the cladistic sense of the term, which includes birds. Extinct archosaurs include non-avian dinosaurs, pterosaurs, and extinct relatives of crocodilians. Modern paleontologists define Archosauria as a crown group that includes the most recent common ancestor of living birds and crocodilians, and all of its descendants.