How many kiwi bird facts you think you know? Kiwis are probably the rarest of the flightless birds which belong to the family Apterygidae. They are also thought to be the smallest of the flightless birds including rheas, cassowaries, emus, and ostriches. Kiwis live in New Zealand. There are five species of kiwi birds.
Kiwi Bird Facts for Kids
Adult kiwis weighed up to 450 grams. The great spotted kiwi is the biggest of the kiwi birds with a height of 45 cm. Adult males weigh as much as 5.3 pounds.
They have unusually long bill and 13 feathers.
They are not really social birds. Kiwis come out to eat at night. They have adapted to living a nocturnal lifestyle probably to avoid potential predators during the day. Sometimes however they do emerge in daylight.
Kiwi bird makes ho
me in many different habitats such as beech forests, temperate podocarp, tussock grasslands, mountains sub-alpine scrub, and subtropical forests.
Kiwis will avoid humans inasmuch as they possibly can.
They possess an acute sense of smell which is quite rare in birds.
Kiwi Bird Diet: Kiwi birds prefer to eat worms, grubs, seeds, and small invertebrates. They often smell their prey before they see them. Kiwis are less likely to rely on their relatively poor eyesight.
The breeding season begins in June and ends in March. The female lays only one egg which is nearly 20% the size of its own. The kiwi bird’s egg is 5 – 6 times bigger than the chicken’s egg. A chick is born after an incubation period of 63 – 92 days.
Kiwi Bird Predators: Lately, the kiwi bird’s population is threatened precisely due to the introduction of many land predators. These predators include stoats, dogs, cats, and especially ferrets. Ferrets mostly hunt adult kiwi birds.
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