A bird has to fly, right?
It seems to me that “flying” should be a God-given birthright for birds.
But. That is not always the case. And it is more than just penguins. In fact, there are 126 different species that don’t fly.
Apparently, these particular birds have lost the ability to fly. In most cases, they are island-dwelling birds. That’s right. These birds live on an island with few or no large predators, so they save energy by not flying. Or, they might be very big birds that can protect themselves.
This has kind of been a hot topic among bird scientists for years. They’ve debated the cause and examined the genes of various species to understand why.
There is one group called the ratites. Ratites are a group of mostly flightless, long-legged birds that date all the way back to the dinosaurs. Once the dinos went extinct, it changed the birds. Scientists have now shown through DNA samples that these birds could at one time fly. But without dinosaurs around, waiting to eat them, the birds had their pickings of food, allowing them to grow larger and larger and eventually able to run from predators instead of taking flight.
Other species of birds evolved in other ways. Like, their bodies discovered better uses for the wing. Well. Like penguins. They use their wings to swim. The big penguins use their wings for balance.
Here are seven birds that can no longer fly:
Ostrich
The largest living bird, the ostrich, can grow to be bigger than even the largest of men, coming in at up to 9 feet tall (around 3 meters) and 300 pounds (136 kilograms). Their wings are puny. No flight there.
Penguin
Okay. No flying. But what about that adorable waddle as they walk? None of the 18 species of penguins can fly. But God, can they waddle.
Kiwi
They are shy and nocturnal. Kiwis are the national bird of New Zealand and, of course, the namesake for a uniquely brown and green fuzzy little fruit.
Cassowary
They live in the rainforests of Australia and New Guinea and are the heaviest bird in Australia and the second heaviest in the world. But it’s not just its size that makes it dangerous — it has a huge, sharp toenail on the innermost of its three toes that can tear apart large animals or humans. One word. Pedicure.
Steamer Duck
South American. Large and aggressive. They flap their wings into the surface of the water and use their feet to swim, causing water to go flying in a similar fashion to a steamboat.
Galapagos Flightless Cormorant
They have strong legs. They are excellent at diving for food in shallow ocean waters.
Inaccessible Island Rail
This is the smallest flightless bird in the world. It is only 5 to 6 inches in length and can only be found in one fittingly small place on Earth: Inaccessible Island. The unpopulated island is an extinct volcano in the South Pacific that’s, you guessed it, really hard to get to.
Nobody there to bother those little babies.
So. There we see seven of the 126 flightless birds.
I hope they all have a bus pass.
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“The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease forever to be able to do it.” — J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan
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“Once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.” — Leonardo da Vinci
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“The higher we soar, the smaller we appear to those who cannot fly.” — Friedrich Nietzsche
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The birds that are bound to the ground
