Moira Butterfield - The Secret Life of Birds

If you were a bird, would you like to soar

across the silvery sky like me?

Would you like to loop around the clouds

or skim over the deep blue sea?

I will help you dream of flying.

Fluff up your feathers and fly with me!

I am Speedy the swift, and I will show you what its like to be a bird. Did you know that birds follow invisible pathways in the sky and that they call to each other in thousands of different ways? Some birds can fly faster than the fastest racing car, or even fly backward!

Ill introduce you to my bird friends around the world and you can learn about our fabulous feathers, nests, and chicks, as well as our amazing flying journeys. Ill tell you some bird stories from around the planet, too.

I hope youll enjoy flitting here and there with me.

Are you ready? Lets take to the sky!

Speedy the swift

A tiny baby high up on a tower

I hatched on a warm summers day. Thats just as well because I was bedraggled and shivery, and small enough to fit in your palm.

I had a brother and a sister in the nest with me. Our mother and father took care of us, keeping us warm and feeding us insects. We squawked and squeaked and wriggled together as we grew bigger and stronger.

My mother and father paired up for life like a feathery husband and wife. Every year they flew to the same safe spot to build a nest.

Our nest was high up under the roof of an old, old tower of crumbly stone. There were lots of other swifts on the tower, popping in and out of their nests like neighbors on a street.

At six weeks old I was ready to go. Early one morning, as the sun came up, I said goodbye to my baby home. I spread my feathery wings and flew!

From tails to toes

We birds grow in lots of different shapes and sizes, but we have the same names for the parts of our body.

Close your eyes and see if you can remember all 9 parts on my picture!

I have bristles above each eye to cut down the suns glare. I can move the angle of the bristles to make a good sunshade.

Ostriches have the largest bird eyes. Their eyes are twice the size of your human eye.

My tail is forked. I close it up when I fly fast.

Some birds of paradise have very long tails, much longer than their bodies!

My beak is short and soft. Some birds have much longer, tougher beaks than me. You can find out more about them on .

My legs are short but strong. I tuck them under me when I fly.

Look at those funny flamingo legs! They are way longer than mine.

I have four toes with claws sharp enough to cling onto a wall.

My wings are long and pointed, shaped like sharp little blades for cutting through the air.

My bones are tiny, and hollow inside. They help make my body super-lightweight.

How do I fly?

As my wings push forward through the sky, the air beneath them lifts me up.

I can change the position of my wings and my tail to help me glide or turn.

When Im going really fast my wings are swept back.

A warm and very special raincoat

Our feathers keep us warm and dry... and, help us to fly!

Our longest feathers are on our wings and tails. They are tough, windproof and shaped to help us fly smoothly.

Down the middle there is a stiff quill . Lots of thin fronds called barbs sprout out from it. Between the barbs there are tiny hooks called barbules . They hook everything together smoothly.

Contour feathers overlap around a birds body, like tiny tiles.