4 Flightless Birds From Singapore Zoo

[Katina Piccirilli]

Emusbelong to a family of flightless birds called ratites, which also include ostriches, rheas, cassowaries and kiwis. As the second largest bird in the world after the ostrich, it can run at a speed of up to 50 km/hr.

Like cassowaries, emus swallow stones to grind food in their gizzards. Found only in Australia, emus walk up to 25 km a day in search of food. They travel in pairs, but occasionally form flocks of a few hundred birds.

How were these birds able to colonize these disparate areas? Creation science has three options. First, people carried the birds with them for food on a long voyage and some escaped or were allowed to escape after they arrived on a distant island. Second, the ancestors of these birds could fly and their descendants became flightless and increased in size after arrival. Third, the birds could never fly, but they were carried to these isolated areas on log or vegetation mats soon after the Flood.

Many evolutionists now believe the reason for flightlessness was a change in regulatory DNA that controls flight and not from mutations in protein-coding genes.8 Regulatory DNA determines when and where genes are turned off or on, often due to environmental cues. To establish their case that the loss of flight arises from changes in regulatory DNA, the researchers used DNA that did not code for proteins and found that it was responsible for turning off genes for flight, which would eliminate the mutational mechanism. However, the researchers were not specific about how changes in regulatory DNA caused a loss of flight. Moreover, they admitted that mutations in protein-coding genes could be the cause of flightlessness in some species.

Second, the molecular mechanisms of this are not well understood.9 However, since flightlessness seems to occur so easily, rapidly, and often, how likely is it to be the result of random mutation and natural selection?

Evolutionists now attribute the loss of flight (or at least in most cases) to changes in regulatory DNA, and believe it could happen quickly and easily. This suggests that the change in the regulatory DNA could simply be part of the variety built into some birds at Creation. Flightlessness then could have resulted from environmental cues, often associated with isolated islands, that turned off regulatory DNA, when flight was unnecessary.

The new research reveals the likelihood that post-Flood flightless birds made it to the remote locations by flying. Since it could be difficult to fly long distances over water, the flying birds could have found refuge on the remaining log or vegetation mats left over after the Flood.5,18 One factor favouring the existence of these post-Flood log or vegetation mats is that many creatures (e.g. insects that cannot fly long distances, as well as many mammals, amphibians, and reptiles) also made it to remote islands, including the Hawaiian Islands and Madagascar.19 The Hawaiian Islands are among the most isolated set of islands in the world, but they have an incredible endemic diversity of organisms, including spiders, land snails, crickets, fruit flies, molluscs, and various birds.20 It seems that log or vegetation mats are a plausible way to colonize the Hawaiian Islands.

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The park is a great place to discover birds from all over the world, and it's great for kids, or bird lovers. But if you've not got that long to spend in the city, we think you'll prefer the zoo, which has a huge range of animals, and some birds too.

This list's taxonomic treatment (designation and sequence of orders, families and species) and nomenclature (common and scientific names) follow the conventions of The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World, 2023b edition.[2] The family accounts at the beginning of each heading reflect this taxonomy, as do the species counts found in each family account.

There are many locations for bird watching in Singapore. The habitats include forests, mangroves, rivers, coasts, grasslands, woodlands, marshes, and offshore islands. There are no mountains in Singapore, but there are several hills, i.e., "bukit" (Bt.) in the Malay language.

Anatidae includes the ducks and most duck-like waterfowl, such as geese and swans. These birds are adapted to an aquatic existence with webbed feet, flattened bills, and feathers that are excellent at shedding water due to an oily coating.

Grebes are small to medium-large freshwater diving birds. They have lobed toes and are excellent swimmers and divers. However, they have their feet placed far back on the body, making them quite ungainly on land.

Nightjars are medium-sized nocturnal birds that usually nest on the ground. They have long wings, short legs and very short bills. Most have small feet, of little use for walking, and long pointed wings. Their soft plumage is camouflaged to resemble bark or leaves.

Swifts are small birds which spend the majority of their lives flying. These birds have very short legs and never settle voluntarily on the ground, perching instead only on vertical surfaces. Many swifts have long swept-back wings which resemble a crescent or boomerang.

Rallidae is a large family of small to medium-sized birds which includes the rails, crakes, coots and gallinules. Typically they inhabit dense vegetation in damp environments near lakes, swamps or rivers. In general they are shy and secretive birds, making them difficult to observe. Most species have strong legs and long toes which are well adapted to soft uneven surfaces. They tend to have short, rounded wings and to be weak fliers.

The thick-knees are a group of largely tropical waders in the family Burhinidae. They are found worldwide within the tropical zone, with some species also breeding in temperate Europe and Australia. They are medium to large waders with strong black or yellow-black bills, large yellow eyes and cryptic plumage. Despite being classed as waders, most species have a preference for arid or semi-arid habitats.

Recurvirostridae is a family of large wading birds, which includes the avocets and stilts. The avocets have long legs and long up-curved bills. The stilts have extremely long legs and long, thin, straight bills.

The family Charadriidae includes the plovers, dotterels and lapwings. They are small to medium-sized birds with compact bodies, short, thick necks and long, usually pointed, wings. They are found in open country worldwide, mostly in habitats near water.

The jacanas are a group of tropical waders in the family Jacanidae. They are found throughout the tropics. They are identifiable by their huge feet and claws which enable them to walk on floating vegetation in the shallow lakes that are their preferred habitat.

Scolopacidae is a large diverse family of small to medium-sized shorebirds including the sandpipers, curlews, godwits, shanks, tattlers, woodcocks, snipes, dowitchers and phalaropes. The majority of these species eat small invertebrates picked out of the mud or soil. Variation in length of legs and bills enables multiple species to feed in the same habitat, particularly on the coast, without direct competition for food.

Glareolidae is a family of wading birds comprising the pratincoles, which have short legs, long pointed wings and long forked tails, and the coursers, which have long legs, short wings and long, pointed bills which curve downwards.

The family Stercorariidae are, in general, medium to large birds, typically with grey or brown plumage, often with white markings on the wings. They nest on the ground in temperate and arctic regions and are long-distance migrants.

Laridae is a family of medium to large seabirds, the gulls, terns, and skimmers. Gulls are typically grey or white, often with black markings on the head or wings. They have stout, longish bills and webbed feet. Terns are a group of generally medium to large seabirds typically with grey or white plumage, often with black markings on the head. Most terns hunt fish by diving but some pick insects off the surface of fresh water. Terns are generally long-lived birds, with several species known to live in excess of 30 years.

Though the members of this family are similar in many respects to the southern storm-petrels, including their general appearance and habits, there are enough genetic differences to warrant their placement in a separate family.

Storks are large, long-legged, long-necked, wading birds with long, stout bills. Storks are mute, but bill-clattering is an important mode of communication at the nest. Their nests can be large and may be reused for many years. Many species are migratory.

Frigatebirds are large seabirds usually found over tropical oceans. They are large, black-and-white or completely black, with long wings and deeply forked tails. The males have coloured inflatable throat pouches. They do not swim or walk and cannot take off from a flat surface. Having the largest wingspan-to-body-weight ratio of any bird, they are essentially aerial, able to stay aloft for more than a week.

Anhingas or darters are often called "snake-birds" because of their long thin neck, which gives a snake-like appearance when they swim with their bodies submerged. The males have black and dark-brown plumage, an erectile crest on the nape and a larger bill than the female. The females have much paler plumage especially on the neck and underparts. The darters have completely webbed feet and their legs are short and set far back on the body. Their plumage is somewhat permeable, like that of cormorants, and they spread their wings to dry after diving.

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