This member of the poultry family is giant, memorizing, all around impressive.  This animal is huge.  Fluffy.  Fast.  Beautiful.  With plumage that makes every bird, aside from the peacock, envious, with adaptation that we humans can admire, and with meat delicate and decadent, it is truly amazing that this bird is not a more popular source of protein in every part of the world.

Chicken, pork, and beef, universally loved by meat eaters, are so common that they are ubiquitous in all grocery stores, all restaurants, raised by the herds and consumed by the masses.  How did this giant and delicious bird get missed by our never ending appetite?  It makes no sense.  They can tolerate a large range of temperatures, evident in the fact that they can survive in a desert where heat fluctuates greatly between day and night.

This flightless bird is very distinctive with its tall stature, elongated legs, fat fluffy midsection with a tiny head on top.  Those slim legs can carry this creature at an astonishing 43 mph (70 m/h), granting this the fastest 2 legged creature on this diverse planet.   This is the largest living bird, and lays the largest eggs.  The eggs, with a shell that is as thick as your grandma’s prized porcelain soup terrine, weighing up to 3 pounds, could fed the entire household at breakfast.  The size of the ostrich egg is over 20 times the size of a chicken’s eggs, but surprisingly, this ratio of bird to egg size is rather small.  After seeing the size of an ostrich egg, I have a hard time believing that.  A female ostrich lays about 50 eggs per year.

I don’t think that you realize how giant this bird it.  It is common for it to weight up to 320 pounds, the size of 2 adults!  Male ostriches can be as tall as 9 feet.  This is bird is monstrous in size and normally lives 45 years, but given the right environment can live to 75 years.

Sticking to the bird kingdom protocol, the male ostriches are the more physically attractive gender, with their silky black and white plumage, dressed up everyday in their fanciest tuxedo, while the women don the drab medley of brown plumage.