Birds fly. Birds have feathers. Birds live in nests. That's all we know about birds.
With that in minds, we wanted to know more about birds. We want them to come to our house as our guests. So we made this bird feeder to attract them. Fewer than 10 minutes, came the first chirping bird to have his delicious food. After awhile, he chirped louder inviting his other friends, and within minutes we counted 15 birds circling the seeds.
So moms, start making your own bird feeders! While making it, you can share info on birds. Thanks to duckters, sandiegozoo, sciencekids and randomhistory.
What makes an animal a bird?
The feathers! No other animal has feathers. Other important features for birds are wings and hollow bones. Birds also lay eggs, like reptiles, however are warm-blooded, like mammals. What is bird? Click here. Laugh out your feather here.
What are feathers?
feathers are made of keratin. This is the same stuff that fingernails are made of. A bird's wings have the same bones as a human arm, but they are arranged differently. Some of the bones in a bird's skeleton are hollow. This makes the bird light enough to fly. Video on bird feathers here.
How do birds fly?
Birds fly by flapping their wings and using air pressure to create lift under their wings. Just like airplanes do. The peregrine falcon is one of the fastest birds. It can reach speeds of well over 100 miles per hour when diving. Videos on how do birds fly: here and here.
Fun facts about birds
- An ostrich can run as fast as 43 miles per hour and grow as tall as 9 feet.
- Blue birds can't see the color blue.
- The hummingbird can fly backwards, but it can't walk.
- Condor shells are so thick, it can take a chick a week to break out from its shell.
- The egg of a kiwi can weigh as much as 20% of the mother's body weight.
- Sometimes vultures eat so much they can't fly.
- Scientists believe that birds evolved from theropod dinosaurs.
- Some birds are intelligent enough to create and use tools.
- The chicken is the most common species of bird found in the world.
- Owls cannot swivel their eyes. Instead they move their heads completely around to see straight behind them.
- The most talkative bird in the world is the African gray parrot. One parrot could say over 800 words. Most species of parrots can learn only 50.
- Many birds, such as starlings, sing notes too high for humans to hear.
- Flamingos pair for a lifetime. Some stay with their mates for 50 years or more.
More vocabularies about birds here!!!
What you'll need:
Bowl
Birdseed
1 small envelope of gelatin
String
Cookie cutters
Pencils/ pens/ sturdy plastic straw
Bowl
Birdseed
1 small envelope of gelatin
String
Cookie cutters
Pencils/ pens/ sturdy plastic straw
1. Pour the birdseed into the bowl.
2. Mix the gelatin and water and bring to simmer while stirring. Continue stirring until the gelatin is dissolved.
3. Remove from heat and let cool. If there were any undissolved gelatin, let it go through the sieve. (You may notice that the girls did this activity with their Bapak, so impatient rules.)
4. Mix the gelatin with the birdseed. Stir.
5. Fill the cookie cutter with the mixture.
6. Fill in various cookie cutters.
7. Put through the pencils/ pens/ straw into the mixture to make hole. Let them dry for awhile. Drying overnight gives better result.
8. Take out the pencils/ pens/ straw and put string through the hole. Knot the end.
To birds from us, with lotsa loves!
Hang them in the trees.
Wait and listen for that chirping sounds! Let the children take a video of their feathered guests. Can you spot one bird on the tree?
We're so honored to have our special guest to fully participate in this activity. So Mummy can face masking!
