Did you know that the Guinness Book of World Records came about because Sir Hugh Beaver, the then managing director of the Guinness Breweries, missed a shot at a golden plover during a shooting party on the 10th November 1951?
After the day’s shooting in the North Slob, by the River Slaney in County Wexford, Ireland, a debate ensued about which was the fastest European game bird, the golden plover or the red grouse being the two species up for contention. However, Sir Hugh found that the reference books available at the time could not confirm which was the correct answer*.
He realized that other similar questions must be being hotly debated throughout the world, but there was no single book that could provide the answers. Upon recommendation from a Guinness employee, he commissioned two twin brothers, Norris and Ross McWhirter, from a fact-checking agency in London to write the book that became the Guinness Book of World Records.
The first Guinness Book of World Records was bound on 27th August 1955 and became a best seller within months. The book itself holds a world record, as the best-selling copyrighted book of all time.
The largest bird’s nest ever found was built by a pair of bald eagles near St Petersburg, Florida. When it was discovered in 1963 it measured 2.9 m wide and 6 m deep, and weighed more than 2 tonnes.
The largest bird that ever lived was the elephant bird which became extinct about 1,000 years ago. It was a flightless bird inhabiting the island of Madagascar and weighed about 500 kg and had a height of about 3 m.
Elephant birds’ eggs were larger than those of dinosaurs and are in fact the largest single cell ever to have existed on earth. They had a liquid capacity of over 10 litres which is the equivalent to 7 ostrich eggs or 100 hen’s eggs.
In 2013 a fossilized elephant bird’s egg that was 30 cm high and 21 cm in diameter sold for £66,000 to an anonymous buyer in a London auction.
The most canned drinks opened by a parrot in one minute is 35. It was achieved by Zac, a macaw in San Jose, California, USA, on 12 January 2012.
Zac also holds the Guinness World Records for the most basket balls slam-dunked by a parrot in a minute and he can also cycle, scooter, skateboard and raise a flag.
The largest egg was laid by an ostrich on a farm owned by Kerstin and Gunnar Sahlin in Borlänge, Sweden, on 17th May 2008. It weighed a whopping 2.589 kg.
An average ostrich egg weighs about 1.4 kg and although they are the largest produced by any living birds, they are in fact the smallest eggs in relation to the size of the adults.
The ostrich also produces the strongest bird’s egg which can support the weight of a 115 kg person.
The smallest bird in the world is the bee hummingbird weighing just under 2 g. Male hummingbirds measure 55 mm in total length with their bills taking up half of this, while females are slightly larger at 61 mm.
Bee hummingbirds are endemic to the Cuban archipelago, including the main island of Cuba and the Isle of Youth in the West Indies.
The dusky grouse, previously known as the blue grouse, is a North American bird that migrates just 300 m. During the winter it lives in mountainous pine forests of western North America. It then descends to deciduous woodlands for the breeding season where it feeds on the early crop of seeds and fresh leaves.
In 19091, workmen discovered a 600 kg nest from the tower of a cathedral in Colmar in France to prevent it from toppling over under the nest’s considerable weight. The nest had been constructed by a white stork and was found to include 17 black stockings, five fur caps, three shoes, a white silk blouse’s sleeve, a large piece of leather, and four buttons from the uniform of a railway porter.
Marsh warblers can imitate the calls and songs of up to 80 other species of birds.
Most of these are African passerines found in the marsh warbler’s winter home, but the mimicry of waders, hornbills, and pigeons have been recorded too.
It appears to only learn the songs of birds heard during the summer after it hatches and its first winter and the calls of birds heard in subsequent years are not added to its repertoire.
Males use these varied songs to attract mates and mark out territories. Females usually utter a single non-imitative song but very occasionally will also incorporate other birds’ songs into their vocalizations.
The wandering albatross has the largest wingspan of any bird in the world reaching lengths of 3.65 m. It is also one of the most far-ranging birds with some individuals circumnavigating the Southern Ocean three times in year, covering a distance of 120,000 km.
Wandering albatrosses can remain in the air without flapping their wings for several hours at a time, travelling 22 m for every metre of drop.
Sailors used to capture wandering albatrosses for the long bones in their wings which they would fashion into tobacco pipes. In the Rime of the Ancient Mariner, the fate of a sailor who killed an albatross is immortalized, and there are a number of sailors’ superstitions surrounding albatrosses that live on today.
The greatest distance covered by a ringed bird is 26,000 km (16,250 miles) by a common tern (Sterna hirundo). It was banded as a juvenile on the 30th June 1996 in Finland and was recaptured at Rotamah Island Bird Observatory on the Gippsland Lake in Victoria, Australia on the 24th January 1997. To have reached this destination it would have had to travel 200km (124 miles) a day.
*The golden plover is the faster of the two birds.