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Bird flight is the primary mode of locomotion used by most bird species in which birds take off and fly. Flight assists birds with feeding, breeding , avoiding predators , and migrating . Bird flight includes multiple types of motion, including hovering, taking off, and landing, involving many complex movements.
Birds are one of only four taxonomic groups to have evolved powered flight. A number of animals are capable of aerial locomotion, either by powered flight or by gliding. This trait has appeared by evolution many times, without any single common ancestor. Flight has evolved at least four times in separate animals: insects, pterosaurs, birds, and ...
Birds have various adaptations for flight, including a lightweight skeleton, two large flight muscles, the pectoralis (which accounts for 15% of the total mass of the bird) and the supracoracoideus, as well as a modified forelimb that serves as an aerofoil.
Similar to having light bones, birds also have large respiratory systems with large air spaces that reduce body weight and allow more efficient oxygen exchange required for the high metabolic demands of flight. Birds also have specialized structures called air sacs closely associated with their lungs that store air when the animal inspires ...
Bird anatomy, or the physiological structure of birds' bodies, shows many unique adaptations, mostly aiding flight.Birds have a light skeletal system and light but powerful musculature which, along with circulatory and respiratory systems capable of very high metabolic rates and oxygen supply, permit the bird to fly.
Some researchers have suggested that treating arboreal and cursorial hypotheses as mutually exclusive explanations of the origin of bird flight is incorrect. [25] Researchers in support of synthesizing cite studies that show incipient wings have adaptive advantages for a variety of functions, including arboreal parachuting, WAIR, and horizontal ...
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The term "hawking" comes from the similarity of this behavior to the way hawks take prey in flight, although, whereas raptors may catch prey with their feet, hawking is the behavior of catching insects in the bill. Many birds have a combined strategy of both hawking insects and gleaning them from foliage. Mainly founded in the grass lands and ...