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Alternative name: Common Ostrich
Includes Somali Ostrich
- Struthio camelus
Identification
World's largest bird with males weighing up to 156 kg.
Height 200-250cm, female shorter
- Long bare neck
- legs flesh-pink becoming brighter during the breeding season
Male
Brownish black with white neck collar, wings and tail
Female and Immature
Greyish-brown
Distribution
Sub-Saharan Africa.
Taxonomy
Subspecies: Nominate race is found in north of range from Mauritania to Sudan and northern Uganda, replaced in East Africa by massaicus in southern Kenya and eastern Tanzania (pinkish-grey neck, flushing bright red during the breeding season and narrower white neck ring) and molybdophanes from southern Ethiopia to Somalia and adjacent northeast Kenya (blue-gray neck and legs, blacker body plumage). Southern African range is occupied by australis but pure wild birds are perhaps confined to Namibia and Botswana (neck is greyish, flushing red in breeding male and lacks white collar, tail brown). North-west African birds are sometimes separated as spatzi and Middle Eastern birds belonged to syriacus (extinct). Subspecies molybdophanes treated by some authors as a separate species, Somali Ostrich (S. molybdophanes).
Habitat
Semi-desert, arid short-grass plains and open wooded savanna.
Behaviour
Voice
Mainly silent but makes occasional hissing sounds.
Male has a deep booming during the breeding season.
