Ostrich (Struthio camelus): Facts, Size, Speed and Eggs

What does an ostrich look like?

An ostrich has a long, almost bare neck, a small head with a flat, broad bill and enormous eyes. Each eye is about 50 mm (2 in) across, the largest of any land animal with a backbone, and gives the bird a clear view of predators far across the plains. Long eyelashes help keep out dust and sun.

Adult males are black with white wing and tail plumes. Females and young birds are a softer gray-brown, which helps them blend into dry grass. The bare skin of the neck and thighs is pinkish or gray depending on the subspecies, and in breeding males the front of the shins and the bill can flush bright red or pink.

The feathers are soft and loose because they lack the tiny hooks that zip the vanes of a flying bird’s feathers together. That makes them useless for flight but good at keeping the body warm on cold desert nights and shaded on hot days.

The feet are unique among living birds. An ostrich has only two toes on each foot. The large inner toe carries a thick, hoof-like nail, and the smaller outer toe has no nail at all. Fewer toes means less weight at the end of the leg and a firmer, springier contact with the ground, an adaptation for fast running.

How big is an ostrich?

The common ostrich is the tallest and heaviest bird alive. Males stand 2.1–2.75 m (6 ft 11 in–9 ft) tall and usually weigh 100–130 kg (220–290 lb). Females are smaller, at 1.75–1.9 m (5 ft 9 in–6 ft 3 in) and 90–120 kg (200–260 lb). Exceptional males of the North African subspecies have weighed about 156 kg (346 lb), while some southern birds weigh much less.

For comparison, the next tallest bird, Australia’s emu, stands at most about 1.9 m (6 ft 3 in) and weighs up to 60 kg (132 lb). See the side-by-side figures in emu vs ostrich and the wider ranking in largest birds in the world.

How fast can an ostrich run?

Ostriches are the fastest birds on land and the fastest animals on two legs. They can sprint at about 70 km/h (43 mph) in short bursts and keep up about 50 km/h (31 mph) over longer distances. At full speed a single stride can cover 3–5 m (10–16 ft).

The wings play a part too. Studies of running ostriches show that the birds hold their wings out to help them brake, turn sharply and zigzag when chased. Speed, sharp eyes and stamina are the ostrich’s main defense, and a healthy adult that has spotted a predator is very hard to catch. Read more in How fast can an ostrich run?.

Where do ostriches live?

Wild common ostriches live in Africa, in open country with good all-around visibility: savanna, dry grassland, the Sahel south of the Sahara and, in the southwest, semi-desert and true desert. They avoid dense forest. Their range once covered most of Africa outside the rainforest and reached into the Middle East, but today it is broken into patches, and many surviving birds live in reserves and national parks.

Four subspecies are recognized:

• North African ostrich (S. c. camelus): North and West Africa, now scattered and rare
• Masai ostrich (S. c. massaicus): Kenya and Tanzania
• South African ostrich (S. c. australis): southern Africa
• Arabian ostrich (S. c. syriacus): Arabia and the Middle East, hunted to extinction by about 1966

Farmed ostriches brought to Australia have also formed a small feral population in South Australia.

The Somali ostrich: a separate species

The Somali ostrich (Struthio molybdophanes) of Ethiopia, Somalia, Djibouti and northern and eastern Kenya was long treated as a subspecies. BirdLife International and other major checklists have recognized it as a full species since 2014. It has blue-gray skin on the neck and thighs, prefers bushier country and browses more than its grazing relative. Its numbers have fallen because of hunting and egg collecting, and the IUCN lists it as Vulnerable.

What do ostriches eat?

Ostriches eat mainly plants. They pick seeds, grasses, leaves, shrubs, flowers and fruit, and they also take insects such as locusts, small lizards, rodents and scraps left by predators when they find them. They have no teeth, so they swallow sand and pebbles that help the muscular gizzard grind tough food. The gizzard can hold more than 1 kg (2.2 lb) of material, and up to almost half of it may be sand and stones.

Food is gathered into a ball, or bolus, in the throat before it is swallowed, which is why a feeding ostrich has a bulge sliding down its neck. Ostriches can go for days without drinking, getting water from plants and from their own metabolism, but they drink and bathe readily when water is available.

Behavior and social life

Ostriches are active by day, most of all in the early morning and late afternoon. Outside the breeding season many live alone or in pairs, while in the breeding season and in dry spells they gather in nomadic groups, often of 5–50 birds. They frequently feed alongside zebras, wildebeest and antelopes, and the extra eyes help every animal spot danger.

When a threat appears, an ostrich usually runs. If it cannot get away, or is cornered or defending chicks, it kicks forward and downward with great force, and the big toe claw can cause serious injuries. To hide, an ostrich sits or lies flat with its neck stretched along the ground, which may be the origin of a famous myth. Find out what is really going on in Do ostriches bury their heads in the sand?.

Breeding males make a deep, booming call by puffing up the neck, which can carry a long way across the plains, and they hiss when threatened.

How do ostriches breed?

Ostriches become mature at 2–4 years old. A territorial male courts females with a dramatic display: he drops to the ground, sways his head and neck and waves his white-tipped wings one after the other. He may mate with several hens, but he forms a pair bond with one “major” hen.

The male scrapes a shallow nest pit in the ground. The major hen lays her eggs first, and other “minor” hens add theirs, so one communal nest may hold anywhere from 15 to 60 eggs. The major hen can recognize her own eggs and pushes extras to the edge, where they are less likely to hatch, so only about 20 are incubated in most nests.

Each egg is about 15 cm (5.9 in) long and weighs about 1.4 kg (3.1 lb), the largest egg of any living bird. Incubation is shared: the drab female sits by day and the black male at night, when his plumage is hard to see. The eggs hatch after 35–45 days. Learn more in How big is an ostrich egg?.

Chicks can walk and feed within days. Broods from several families often merge into large groups called crèches, guarded by one or a few adults. Young birds reach adult height in about a year, but life is dangerous at first: fewer than 10% of nests survive to hatching, and only a small share of chicks live to their first birthday.

How long do ostriches live?

Ostriches that survive their first years are among the longest-lived birds. Wild birds are often estimated to live 30–40 years, although this is hard to measure. In captivity ostriches commonly reach 50 years, and the oldest known bird lived more than 62 years.

Predators and threats

Adult ostriches are a challenging target. Lions, leopards, cheetahs, spotted hyenas and African wild dogs can kill them, usually by ambush, but most predators avoid healthy adults because of their speed, vigilance and dangerous kick. Eggs and chicks face many more enemies, including jackals, hyenas, birds of prey, warthogs and mongooses. Egyptian vultures are known for throwing stones at ostrich eggs to break the thick shells.

People are the main threat. Wild ostriches were hunted heavily for meat, eggs and feathers, and in the 18th and 19th centuries the demand for plumes in fashion pushed them toward extinction in many areas. Today habitat loss, hunting and egg collecting continue to reduce wild numbers, especially in North and West Africa.

Conservation status

The IUCN Red List classes the common ostrich as Least Concern, mainly because its total range is still enormous, at roughly 9.8 million km² (3.8 million sq mi). The population trend, however, is listed as decreasing, and wild ostriches have disappeared from much of their former range. The Arabian subspecies is extinct, and the North African populations are listed on Appendix I of CITES, which bans commercial international trade in them.

Myths and facts about ostriches

Myth: ostriches bury their heads in the sand. They do not. The story goes back at least to the Roman writer Pliny the Elder. Ostriches lie flat to hide, swallow sand and pebbles, and turn their eggs in a nest pit with their bills, and any of these may have inspired it.

Fact: an ostrich’s eye is bigger than its brain. Each eye is about 50 mm (2 in) across, and the brain is smaller than one eyeball.

Fact: ostriches are living dinosaurs. Like all birds, they descend from theropod dinosaurs, and scientists use ostriches to study how large two-legged dinosaurs may have moved.

Ostriches and people

People have prized ostriches for thousands of years. Ostrich eggshells engraved with patterns about 60,000 years ago have been found at Diepkloof Rock Shelter in South Africa, and hunter-gatherers of the Kalahari have long used empty eggs as water flasks. Ancient Egyptians used the plumes as symbols, and Romans displayed ostriches in arenas.

Commercial ostrich farming began in South Africa in the 19th century to supply feathers for hats and fans. The feather trade collapsed around World War I, but ostriches are still farmed worldwide for leather, meat and feathers, and the Little Karoo town of Oudtshoorn remains a center of the industry. Despite its fame on farms, a wild ostrich remains a powerful animal that deserves a respectful distance; see Are ostriches dangerous?.