Have you noticed that most of our superheroes have abilities similar to birds? Superman is known for his ability to fly. Even his introduction says, "It's a Bird...It's a Plane...It's Superman". We all know the special abilities of Batman, whose character is inspired by the features of a bat. Falcon is another superhero who can fly and has the ability to talk to his pet bird. As you can see, birds possess some uncommon features that can inspire most of our superheroes. The unique features of a bird tends to tickle the imaginative corner of a writer's brain. Thus, helping them create copies of heroes with avian super-ability. However, our birds are in reality no less than our superheroes. I shall cover information related to birds with different behavior in the following paragraphs. What Special Features Do Birds Have? Birds have many unusual physical abilities, right from having lightweight hollow bones to possessing really powerful talons. Some use these features for self-defense, some use them to catch prey and for some these abilities spell fun, like our very own lyrebird. (Click on the image for a better view.) So, let us begin our list with... Other Special Features of Birds Apart from the special mentions in the preceding paragraphs, there are many other unique characteristics of birds. Some of these birds with unique behavior and abilities are as follows:

• A bird from Australia, the brush turkey has an uncommon behavior. Unlike other birds who sit on their eggs to hatch them, these birds make mound-shaped nests. These nests are made of decaying matter, mud and other organic waste. The eggs are placed under this mound nest, so that they can hatch due to the heat produced during the process of organic decay.
• The lazy cuckoo and cowbird never make a nest of their own. Instead they lay their eggs in the nests of other birds. These unsuspecting parents raise the cuckoo or cowbird young as their own!
• The hornbill is one strange bird. After mating, the male hornbill seals his partner along with their eggs in a hole of a tree. Only a small opening is left for the male to regurgitate food into the hole for the female. The female will make an appearance only after all her young have hatched.
• There are about 3000 individual feathers present on the body of an American Robin and about 7000 on a bald eagle!
• The fastest horizontal flier with a speed of 105 miles/hour is the spine-tailed swift. The Peregrine falcon is the fastest bird with a speed of up to 270 miles/hour when swooping down on its prey.

These were some of the unique features of birds. There are over 10,000 species of birds in the world and each one has a distinctive ability that helps it survive. Avian power is mightier than our very own superhero power. Even our very own chickens have a special ability: they can travel at the speed of 9 miles/hour if need be. Hope you have enjoyed reading some of these interesting and little known facts about birds.