Is the cassowary a bird?

Cassowaries are a genus of large animals from Australia, New Guinea and Indonesia. Cassowaries look like birds, but are incredibly large and flightless. For many, this raises the question that exactly cassowary. Is the cassowary a bird or something else? Let’s dig in.

Is the cassowary a bird?

First, yes, the cassowary is a bird. Belongs to the biological class aves, which includes all modern birds.

There are some key similarities between birds and mammals.

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• Both have hearts and are vertebrates.
• In addition, birds and mammals share warm-bloodedness.

However, given that birds are descended from dinosaurs (and are their closest living relatives), there are some key traits that define birds.

First, birds have wings. Although most birds fly (more on this below), it is not necessary to fly to be a bird. Cassowaries are flightless birds, which makes them rare, but they do have wings.

Birds are also feathered. Cassowaries have a “fluffy” appearance, but it is not their body hair, but shiny feathers that are quite unique to all birds.

The birds also have beaks, a light skeleton (which most species use for flight), and lay eggs with hard shells. Cassowary eggs are unique in that they are light green in color and very large in size. Cassowaries have beaks that connect to a large “helmet” on their head, which gives them a unique look. It is suggested that this helmet be used to help cassowaries cut through the strand and brush when running at high speeds.

Add it up, and while cassowaries don’t fly, they have all the bird traits in common.

Classification of cassowaries

Cassowaries are related to other large flightless birds through the Palaeognathae hoard, which includes ostriches, tinamo, rhea, emu, and kiwi. There are 60 species in total in this hoard, while all other birds belong to the much larger Neognathae, which is home to more than 10,000 bird species.

The closest relative of the cassowary is the emu, belonging to the same order. There are three types of cassowary and only one type of emu.

It is believed that cassowaries first appeared shortly after the extinction of the dinosaurs, about 60 million years ago. Cassowaries are incredibly similar in appearance to a recently discovered dinosaur, indicating that cassowaries were one of the closest remaining links by the time dinosaurs roamed the Earth.

Cassowaries – Endangered Bird Species?

Of the 10,000 species that exist in the world today, about 12% are endangered. As of 2021, all three species of cassowary are included in the list of the least dangerous.

This was not always the case, as the pygmy cassowary was previously listed as endangered by the IUCN until 2013, but its status has changed. Both pygmy and northern cassowaries have relatively smaller geographic ranges that cover only part of New Guinea and some of the smaller surrounding islands. The southern cassowary also lives in Australia, through its range limited to Cape York Peninsula in Queensland.