By Titilayo Kupoliyi
If you are asked to name the most dangerous animal in the world, what may readily come to mind would have been a lion or a tiger.
Though they have dangerous features, they are however not as dangerous as Cassowaries.
Cassowaries are native to Northern Australia, New Guinea, and surrounding islands.
They are classified as ratites (flightless birds without a keel on their sternum bones).
Three species are in existence: The most common, the southern cassowary, is the third-tallest and second-heaviest living bird, smaller only than the ostrich and emu. The other two species are represented by the northern cassowary and the dwarf cassowary; the northern cassowary is the most recently discovered and the most threatened. A fourth but extinct species is represented by the pygmy cassowary.
Cassowaries feed mainly on fruit, although all species are omnivorous and take a range of other plant foods, including shoots and grass seeds, in addition to fungi, invertebrates, and small vertebrates.
Cassowaries are very wary of humans, but if provoked, they are capable of inflicting serious, even fatal, injuries to both dogs and people hence the cassowary has often been labelled “the world’s most dangerous bird”
Report shows that cassowaries are shy and they are usually hard to spot, at least in their natural rainforest habitats.
The largest cassowaries can stand as high as six feet and weigh up to 160 pounds.
These large birds cannot fly, but their extremely powerful legs propel them at great speeds.
They are strong swimmers and can move quickly on both land and water.
Cassowaries have been clocked running as fast as 31 miles per hour through the rainforest.
Their powerful legs also help them jump high, up to 7 feet straight into the air. Their legs are also used for delivering strong kicks, and they can use their sharp dagger-like claws, up to 4 inches long, to slice and puncture any animal that is a threat, including humans.
Female cassowaries lay their eggs in a nest on the forest floor.
There are usually about three eggs in the nest, and the male sits on them for about 50 days until they hatch.
A cassowary egg can weigh about the same as 10 average chicken eggs!
Cassowaries are culturally important for some Aboriginal groups, and they sometimes feature in traditional ceremonies, dances and dreamtime narratives.
Several of these indigenous groups are now involved in cassowary conservation, using traditional ecological knowledge along with modern science.
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