Few places are tougher than the Antarctic. Chin-strapped penguins: every day they travel up to fifty miles out to sea hunting for krill. But the hard part is getting this food back to the colony ... For a flightless bird getting to the top of the volcano is a gruelling climb ... Now she joins penguin rush hour ... She must try and find her family among a hundred and fifty thousand birds. ibid.
Great white pelicans ... These pelicans are amongst the heaviest flying birds in the world. ibid.
Cape gannets plunge deep, hunting fish beyond the reach of the pelicans. ibid.
From the Equator to the Poles birds have found the most ingenious ways of overcoming the many challenges of life. And everything revolves around their unique attribute: feathers. ibid.
Studies about gigantic birds had been circulating in Europe since the thirteenth century. David Attenborough and the Giant Egg, 2011
The Elephant Bird: beyond the legends what do we know of it? ibid.
It is estimated that the Elephant Bird weighed half a ton ... The heaviest bird that ever existed. And of course it was flightless. ibid.
Eggs were a huge source of nourishment. ibid.
China: the intriguing link between dinosaurs and birds. David Attenborough's Rise of Animals: Triumph of the Vertebrates, BBC 2013
Short-tailed shearwaters have travelled ten thousand miles from Australia to be here. Eighteen million visitors darken the skies, the largest gathering of sea-birds on the planet. Humpback whales have come all the way from the Equator to feed in these rich polar waters. David Attenborough, Frozen Planet I, BBC 2011
Albatross: the largest wingspan in the world. David Attenborough, Frozen Planet II: Spring
Vast sea-bird colonies are the jewels of the Arctic. David Attenborough, Frozen Planet IV: Autumn
These hundred-metre high cliffs are home to thousands of Guillemots. David Attenborough, Frozen Planet VI: The Last Frontier
Waved Albatrosses are monogamous – they mate for life. David Attenborough’s Galapagos: Adaptation, Sky 2013
The presence of human beings has stopped this Finch from evolving. David Attenborough’s Galapagos: Evolution
5) The Marvellous Spatuletail Hummingbird: in a remote corner of Peru. Attenborough’s Ark: Natural World Special, BBC 2012
One predator they can never see coming: the bald-headed eagle. David Attenborough, Nature’s Great Events II: The Great Salmon Run, BBC 2009
There are birds which can dive. David Attenborough, The Blue Planet V: Seasonal Seas, BBC 2001
Frigatebirds display and exchange nesting material. David Attenborough: The Blue Planet VIII: Coasts
95% of the world’s sea birds nest together. ibid.
Many puffins now find it hard to get enough food for their chicks. David Attenborough, Blue Planet s2e6: Coasts, BBC 2017
Everyone likes birds. What wild creature is more accessible to our eyes and ears, as close to us and everyone in the world, as universal as a bird? David Attenborough
Birds today are the masters of the skies. But they were not the first creatures to fly. And they are certainly not the biggest. David Attenborough: Flying Monsters, Sky 2011
They were reptiles: pterosaurs; they evolved into a huge variety of species, some the size of aeroplanes. ibid.
Why did these magnificent beasts take to the air in the first place? ibid.
Around 250 million years ago: the planet then was a very different place. ibid.
Draco ... It jumps but it does more than just leap; it extends the width of its body by opening flaps of skin along its flanks, and they enable it to glide. ibid.
This is the Jurassic Coast: its rocks are full of fossils of prehistoric creatures. ibid.
Her name was Mary Anning ... She had an almost unbelievable talent for unearthing fossils .. the Princess of Palaeontology. ibid.
The big head and pointed teeth of Darwinopterus makes it clear that this was a predator so it must have been very agile in the air. ibid.
This fossil is 140 million years old: it has the enlarged head of an advanced pterosaur but its tail is different – it has become much shorter. And this short-tailed species wasn’t alone. It was clearly a very successful modification. ibid.
This ability to walk had a profound effect on pterosaur evolution. ibid.
There were several kinds of feathered reptile living about this time. ibid.
The largest creature ever to fly lived 70 million years ago during the Cretaceous period. It stood twenty feet high, so tall it could look a giraffe in the eye: Quetzalcoatlus. ibid.
Then suddenly they vanished. A meteor that crashed into Earth sixty-five million years ago is often blamed for the extinction of the dinosaurs and the pterosaurs, but the truth is that their fate was already sealed. ibid.
It was the birds who rose from the ashes of that meteor. ibid.
Birds today have evolved into thousands of species. ibid.
The dynasty of the pterosaurs lasted over a hundred and fifty million years. ibid.
For five hundred years these birds have been surrounded by myth and glamour ... A hugely varied family ... The most spectacular and beautiful birds on earth – the birds of paradise. Attenborough’s Paradise Birds, BBC 2015
A few species display not up in the branches but on the ground. ibid.
One of the great wonders of the natural world. ibid.
By and large this is the kingdom of the birds. The first birds flew about a hundred and fifty million years ago. They spread around the globe. David Attenborough’s Conquest of the Skies III, Sky 2015
The albatross have the longest wingspan of any bird. David Attenborough, The Hunt IV: Hunger at Sea (Oceans), BBC 2015
There is safety in numbers: flocking is a key defence strategy for birds that live out in the open. David Attenborough, The Hunt V: Nowhere to Hide (Plains)
Two animals that have mastered the problems of life in the dark: the giant squid which lives in the deepest oceans and owls. Attenborough’s Natural Curiosities s2e3: Life in the Dark, UKTV 2013
Owls: they are extremely good at seeing at low-light levels. ibid.
They can rotate their heads nearly all the way round … 270 degrees. ibid.
The call of a killer and a cheat: the cuckoo lays its egg in the nests of other birds and somehow persuades them to treat and it and its chick as if it were their own. Attenborough’s Natural Curiosities s2e4: Curious Imposters
It [cuckoo chick] now uses vocal deception to trick its foster parents into providing more food. ibid.
Spiders spin intricate webs using their own silk and birds weave nests from sticks and leaves. Attenborough’s Natural Curiosities s2e8: Spinners & Weavers
Weaver birds’ nests … Nest building is largely under genetic control … The only birds that can tie knots. ibid.
Swallows have successfully nested and raised their young in this barn for several years … In a few weeks’ time they will suddenly vanish ... Early in the 20th century the study of migration really took off. Attenborough’s Natural Curiosities s2e10: Magical Appearances
Orangutans have an extraordinary ability to use tools … Surprisingly, crows also make tools. Attenborough’s Natural Curiosities s3e2: Curious Minds
Ravens are cheeky, self aware and socially intelligent. They are part of the big crow family … Their brains are twice as large as other birds. ibid.
Two animals whose extraordinary body-shapes are determined by their diets: the blue whale grows enormous by feeding on tiny shrimp-like creatures while flamingos spend their lives eating with their heads upside down, and yet both ways are curiously similar. Attenborough’s Natural Curiosities s3e4: Curious Feeders
For a long time the flamingos are birds of myth and mystery. ibid.
Here on the coast of Peru there are so many seabirds fishing in the offshore waters that the cliffs are covered in droppings over a metre thick. David Attenborough, Seven World, One Planet III: South America, BBC 2019
Once fledged, these young [parrots] will follow their parents for up to a year learning where to find the salts. ibid.