Little Kiwi: 5 facts

It's easy for many of us to identify with Bob Darroch's flightless friend Little Kiwi, but how much do you know about the real thing? Here are some quick facts to get you up to speed.

1. They are the only bird species which doesn’t have wings at all
After millennia of evolution, Kiwis only have a little nub where their ancient wings used to be. This differs from other flightless birds (like emus or ostriches) who still have wings but they aren’t used to fly. However, Kiwis are in the same family as those flightless birds, the ratites.

2. The kiwi lays the biggest egg in proportion to its size of any bird in the world
Kiwis are small birds – about the size of a chicken – but their eggs are massive! They are six times the size of a chicken egg. Imagine laying that!

3. Kiwis with a capital K are people; lowercase kiwis are birds
The grammar rule when talking about kiwi is that if you spell kiwi with a capital K, you’re talking about the people of New Zealand. Use a lower case ‘k’ when referring to the bird (unless it’s the start of your sentence, that is).

4. Kiwis have a highly developed sense of smell
Most birds use other senses to get around such as sight (like eagles) or hearing (like owls), but kiwis use their sense of smell. This is because they hunt in the dirt and undergrowth of forests for food like grubs. Their nostrils are at the end of their beaks so they don’t need to see when foraging.

5. Kiwis are sadly endangered
Once upon a time New Zealand had no predating mammals (except for three types of bat), and kiwis were free to roam about. But after humans came to New Zealand – starting with the first Polynesians who would become Maori, and later Europeans – because kiwis can’t fly their populations have been decimated by deforestation and predators (particularly stoats, cats and possums, but also dogs and wild pigs). Of the five types of kiwi, two are vulnerable, one is endangered and one is critically endangered. But it’s not all sad, many people around NZ are trying very hard to save the kiwi, and they’re having some great results.