Hoatzin: special chicks with claws on their wings (6 photos)

Born to fly, can't crawl. Is that how the phraseological unit sounds? Today we have a bird that was born to crawl, but can fly quite well. Hoatzin chicks have a very unique way of moving due to the peculiarities of their body.





Almost all other birds don't have claws on their wings. Especially not such impressive ones.



I'm my mom's Spider-Man.

At first glance, they're just like regular birds. They sit in an egg, incubate for a month, then hatch as standard bald chicks with one little twist - they have claws on their wings! Yeah, like those same bird dinosaurs like the famous Archaeopteryx.





Archaeopteryx and its clawed feet.

Strictly speaking, modern birds are dinosaurs (namely, bird ones). Scientists are still arguing about the reasons for the presence of claws in hoatzins: either they were preserved in the process of evolution, or the ancestors of hoatzins first lost these claws and then re-acquired them. In general, the chicks can quite cheerfully crawl here and there on trees if they need to. But, in any case, the fact that you can unscrew the nest in case of danger, and then, when the danger has passed, screw it back in, is amazing, isn't it?



By the way, this is what an adult hoatzin looks like. The birds really do resemble late feathered dinosaurs.



Adult hoatzin closer. They say that hoatzins stink terribly and being even a few meters away from their nest is unbearably nauseating.

Unfortunately, these birds only have such cool grasping and clinging adaptations during the first three months of life. Then the claws on the upper limbs simply fall off, and the hoatzin turns into a large tree chicken (earlier they were classified as a Galliformes, but now they are singled out as a separate detachment), which does not fly very well - only 300-400 meters without rest. So, when the time comes to grow up, they switch mainly to the jumping form of movement in space and from unique children turn into standard slow-moving oafs. These are the South American birds!



Taxi! Take me to the nest...