Like its neighbour Australia, New Zealand is a land with animals all of its own or at least birds of its own.
Like its neighbour Australia, New Zealand is a land with animals all of its own or at least birds of its own.
Originally there were no mammals at all in New Zealand aside from two kinds of bats. There are no land snakes there either. But there are plenty of birds, more than 250 kinds that can be found nowhere but in New Zealand.
One of the most unusual of these is the kiwi, which is also known as the apteryx. It is a brownish bird about the size of a chicken with a long, slender bill.
Apteryx means "without wings" in Greek, but the bird actually does have small wings buried in its feathers. The kiwi doesn't use them to fly because it can't fly at all, but it can run very quickly.
The kiwi has its nostrils at the end of its long bill. It uses the bill the way a blind man uses a cane, poking along the ground as it walks, sniffing for worms .
In relation to its size, it lays the largest eggs of any bird on earth. The eggs may be 12,5cm long and 7,5cm wide. - bigsiteofamazingfacts.com
Kiwi an odd bird
Like its neighbour Australia, New Zealand is a land with animals all of its own or at least birds of its own.
Like its neighbour Australia, New Zealand is a land with animals all of its own or at least birds of its own.
Originally there were no mammals at all in New Zealand aside from two kinds of bats. There are no land snakes there either. But there are plenty of birds, more than 250 kinds that can be found nowhere but in New Zealand.
One of the most unusual of these is the kiwi, which is also known as the apteryx. It is a brownish bird about the size of a chicken with a long, slender bill.
Apteryx means "without wings" in Greek, but the bird actually does have small wings buried in its feathers. The kiwi doesn't use them to fly because it can't fly at all, but it can run very quickly.
The kiwi has its nostrils at the end of its long bill. It uses the bill the way a blind man uses a cane, poking along the ground as it walks, sniffing for worms .
In relation to its size, it lays the largest eggs of any bird on earth. The eggs may be 12,5cm long and 7,5cm wide. - bigsiteofamazingfacts.com