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Animals · Savanna and grasslands

Ostrich

Struthio camelus

The largest living bird on Earth

An adult male ostrich runs across the savanna with its neck extended and wings slightly spread open.
An adult male ostrich runs across the savanna with its neck extended and wings slightly spread open.
  • Status: Safe
  • Savannas and steppes of sub-Saharan Africa, from the Sahel to South Africa

Numbers

Weight
310 lbfrom 265 to 350 lb; Wikidata reports 220 and 250 lb for adults and 3.3 lb for the chick
Length
6 ftbeak to tail, minimum stated value
Height
9 ftfrom 8 to 10 ft
Lifespan
40 yearsfrom 30 to 40 years in the wild
Speed
45 mphpeaks over 60 mph
Egg size
25 times a chicken eggthe largest egg among living birds
Eggs in shared nest
20 eggs or morenest shared by several females of the same male

Ten fun facts

  1. the legend that it hides its head in the sand is false, as it actually crouches low pretending to be a bush.

  2. its egg is the largest among living birds and is roughly equivalent to twenty-five chicken eggs.

  3. several females from the same harem lay their eggs in a single nest, which sometimes contains over twenty eggs.

  4. the birds take turns incubating eggs, with the dominant female sitting on them during the day and the male at night.

  5. chicks run and forage right after hatching, becoming completely independent from their parents in just fourteen days.

  6. a surprising fact about chicks is that they search for vital nutrients by foraging through their parents' droppings.

  7. of the four recognized subspecies, the Arabian ostrich is extinct, although the species as a whole remains safe.

  8. the first successful farm in captivity was established in Algeria in 1856, after long being considered impossible.

  9. in ancient Rome, ostrich brains were served at wealthy banquets as a rare and luxurious delicacy.

  10. each foot has only two toes, with the inner toe bearing a claw powerful enough to kill lions and hyenas.

The quiz answers

Five questions about this animal. Pick an answer and find out if it is the right one.

Question 1 of 5

Legend says the ostrich hides its head in the sand out of fear. Is it true?

Question 2 of 5

How many toes does an ostrich have on each foot?

Question 3 of 5

What is one ostrich egg roughly equal to?

Question 4 of 5

Who incubates the eggs at night?

Question 5 of 5

What is its top running speed?

Try it yourself

Experiment 1

Draw a circle on the floor as wide as an ostrich nest and try to imagine twenty eggs inside: that is how many a single shared nest can hold.

Experiment 2

Run for ten seconds and have a friend measure your distance: at forty-five miles per hour, an ostrich would cover over six hundred feet in that time.

Experiment 3

Line up twenty-five chicken eggs, real or drawn: that is equal to the volume of a single ostrich egg, the largest of any bird.

Data from Wikidata (Q17592) and Wikipedia (Common ostrich).