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Name : Hoatzin ( Opisthocomus hoazin )
Where it lives : Amazon and Orinoco river lavatory in South America
Hoatzins are considered evolutionary orphans as it’s unclear where they sit within the avian family tree.
What it eat up : Leaves , fruit and flowers
Why it ’s awful : The hoactzin is often reckon as one of the world ’s unknown birds . Hatchlings are born with clawed backstage — a rare , prehistoric trait — and adult give off a strong , unpleasant odour due to their cow - similar , ferment digestive organization , make them the nickname " stinkbird . "
Hoatzin have some pretty unearthly trait , with mohican crest , downhearted facial pelt , flushed eyes and tumid , fan - shape tails , which they used to maintain equipoise while pilot dense vegetation .
Hoatzin smell because of their cow-like fermenting digestive system.
But these tropical doll are most illustrious for their pungent smell , which is ordinarily compared to manure or rotting vegetation . This unpleasant smell is the result of a highly unusual digestive mental process that set them aside from almost every other bird species .
Unlike most dame , the hoatzin has a foregut fermentation system , standardised to the one found in cow . It primarily feeds on leaves , which it store and ferments in a large , chambered crop — a temporary food storage sack locate in the oesophagus . Then , the solid food is pop off to the stomach forfermentation , where bacteria wear out down the tough plant stuff , resign gases via burping that produce the bird ’s distinctive manure - like olfactory sensation .
This digestive procedure is extremely efficient for breaking down the high levels of cellulose find in leaves . But , it make the Opisthocomus hoazin both smelly and gawky , as its exaggerated gut piddle it difficult to fly . However , the stinkbird ’s strange smell acts as a natural defense mechanism , as predators tend to invalidate the bird because they reckon it is icky or poisonous .
investigator are uncertain about the phylogenesis of hoatzins . In 2015,a transmissible study in the journal Naturesuggested that the stinkbird is the last exist phallus of a bird line of descent that furcate off the evolutionary Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree in its own direction 64 million yr ago , shortly after the quenching event that wiped out the non - avian dinosaur .
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However , a separate2024 study in PNASsuggested that stinkbird are not as ancient as previously thought . Although the annexe claws of juveniles seem prehistorical , they may have evolved more recently to aid these birds last in the Amazon hobo camp . As youthful hoatzin ca n’t fell , their claws let them to climb tree to get away predators .
In 2024,biologists analyzed and map the genomes of more than 360 bird speciesto make a family tree of major raspberry grouping , but where hoatzin fit into the picture is indecipherable . The researcher tally stinkbird to a family called"orphans"along with shorebirds and cranes — because it ’s unclear where hoatzins sit within the avian family unit tree diagram .
This bird is also the home boo of Guyana , where the local name for this bird is Canje pheasant .
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