What is the smallest species of bird?
6576473#29
With a mass of approximately and a length of 5 centimetres (2.0 in), the bee hummingbird ("Mellisuga helenae") is the world's smallest bird species and the smallest warm-blooded vertebrate. Called the "zunzún" in its native habitat on Cuba, it is lighter than a Canadian or U.S. penny. It is said that it is "more apt to be mistaken for a bee than a bird". The bee hummingbird eats half its total body mass and drinks eight times its total body mass each day. Its nest is 3 cm across.
Smallest organisms
70649#0
Hummingbirds are birds native to the Americas and constitute the biological family Trochilidae. They are among the smallest of birds, most species measuring in length. Indeed, the smallest extant bird species is a hummingbird, the bee hummingbird weighing less than .
Hummingbird
103190#7
Wrens are medium-small to very small birds. The Eurasian wren is among the smallest birds in its range, while the smaller species from the Americas are among the smallest passerines in that part of the world. They range in size from the white-bellied wren, which averages under and , to the giant wren, which averages about and weighs almost . The dominating colors of their plumage are generally drab, composed of gray, brown, black, and white, and most species show some barring, especially to tail and/or wings. No sexual dimorphism is seen in the plumage of wrens, and little difference exists between young birds and adults. All have fairly long, straight to marginally decurved bills.
Wren
2280298#2
This petite species is not only the smallest North American "Spinus" finch, it may be the smallest true finch in the world. Some sources list more subtropical "Spinus" species as slightly smaller on average, including the Andean siskin. This species ranges from in length and can weigh from . Among standard measurements, the wing chord is , the tail is , the bill is and the tarsus is . There is a slight NW-SE cline in size, with the largest birds from Mexico and south being up to one-fifth larger than the smallest from the extreme NW of its range; this effect is more pronounced in females. There is also considerable variation in the amount of black on head and back in males, and thus three subspecies have been proposed. But this variation too seem to be simple and clinal changes in allele frequency, and thus the "subspecies" might be better considered morphs or geographical forms.
Males are easily recognized by their bright yellow underparts and big white patches in the tail (outer rectrices) and on the wings (the base of the primaries). They range from having solid black from the back to the upper head including the ear-coverts to having these regions medium green; each of the back, crown and ear regions varies in darkness rather independently though as a rule the ears are not darker than the rest. In most of the range dark psaltria birds (Arkansas goldfinch) predominate. The light birds are termed hesperophilus and are most common in the far western U.S. and northwestern Mexico.
Lesser goldfinch
927476#0
Flightless birds are birds that through evolution lost the ability to fly. There are over 60 extant species including the well known ratites (ostrich, emu, cassowary, rhea and kiwi) and penguins. The smallest flightless bird is the Inaccessible Island rail (length 12.5 cm, weight 34.7 g). The largest (both heaviest and tallest) flightless bird, which is also the largest living bird, is the ostrich (2.7 m, 156 kg). Ostriches are farmed for their decorative feathers, meat and their skins, which are used to make leather.
Flightless bird
12434622#0
The dot-winged crake ("Porzana spiloptera") is a species of bird in the family Rallidae. Despite its morphological similarities, the assignment to the genus "Porzana" is not correct. Phylogenetic analyses of mitochondrial DNA placed it in the predominantly South American clade "Laterallus", and further analyses revealed that it is the sister species of the world's smallest flightless bird, the Inaccessible Island rail ("Atlantisia rogersi"). Stervander et al. (2019) proposed that the dot-winged crake should be referred to as "Laterallus spilopterus".
Dot-winged crake
206491#1
Bustards are all fairly large with the two largest species, the kori bustard ("Ardeotis kori") and the great bustard ("Otis tarda"), being frequently cited as the world's heaviest flying birds. In both the largest species, large males exceed a weight of , weigh around on average and can attain a total length of . The smallest species is the little brown bustard ("Eupodotis humilis"), which is around long and weighs around on average. In most bustards, males are substantially larger than females, often about 30% longer and sometimes more than twice the weight. They are among the most sexually dimorphic groups of birds. In only the floricans is the sexual dimorphism reverse, with the adult female being slightly larger and heavier than the male.
Bustard
12422792#1
It is the world’s smallest cuckoo, being only in length, and parasitises chiefly dome-shaped nests of various "Gerygone" species, having a range that largely corresponds with the distribution of that genus. It may also parasitise other Acanthizidae species, and is also the most southerly ranging brood parasitic bird species in the world, extending to 45°S in New Zealand.
Shining bronze cuckoo
9205088#2
Apart from the giant teratorn "Argentavis magnificens", the biggest of the pseudotooth birds were the largest flying birds known. Almost all of their remains from the Neogene are immense, but in the Paleogene there were a number of pelagornithids that were around the size of a great albatross (genus "Diomedea") or even a bit smaller. The undescribed species provisionally called "Odontoptila inexpectata" – from the Paleocene-Eocene boundary of Morocco – is the smallest pseudotooth bird discovered to date and was just a bit larger than a white-chinned petrel ("Procellaria aequinoctialis").
Pelagornithidae
265787#2
The smallest family members are the closely related short-tailed pygmy tyrant and black-capped pygmy tyrant from the genus "Myiornis" (the first species usually being considered marginally smaller on average). These species reach a total length of and a weight of 4–5 grams. By length, they are the smallest passerines on earth, although some species of Old World warblers apparently rival them in their minuscule mean body masses if not in total length. The minuscule size and very short tail of the "Myiornis" pygmy tyrants often lend them a resemblance to a tiny ball or insect. The largest tyrant flycatcher is the great shrike-tyrant at and . A few species such as the streamer-tailed tyrant, scissor-tailed flycatcher and fork-tailed flycatcher have a larger total length (up to ), but this is mainly due to their extremely long tails; the fork-tailed flycatcher has relatively the longest tail feathers of any known bird.
Tyrant flycatcher