By weight, the Bee Hummingbird of Cuba is the lightest, weighing around 1.6 to 2.0 grams. It has a length of about 5.5 cm – still a bit bigger than the largest bee species, Wallace’s Giant Bee, whose females have a length of about 3.8 cm.
Predictably, the heaviest is the Ostrich, weighing about 100-160 kg and reaching a height of up to 2.7 meters. It can be found in Africa. While it is flightless, it compensates for that by being the fastest runner among all birds, reaching speeds of about 70 km/h. That is almost twice the speed of the fastest humans.
Photos taken from Pexels
Kai has lived in Shanghai for 21 years. He only started birding after moving to China, so he is far more familiar with Chinese birds than the ones back in his native Germany. As a birder, he considers himself strictly average and tries to make up for it with photography, which he shares on a separate website. Alas, most of the photos are pretty average as well.He hopes that few clients of his consulting firm—focused on China’s chemical industry—ever find this blog, as it might raise questions about his professional priorities. Much of his time is spent either editing posts for 10,000 Birds or cleaning the litter boxes of his numerous indoor cats. He occasionally considers writing a piece comparing the two activities.
Part of the fascination of birds has to be the huge variety of species, from tiny to huge. Evolution is a marvellous thing.