These birds are called Megapodes due to their large feet. When they lay eggs, they give no care at all to it and use volcanic ash to heat it up! Now, let me tell about this amazing bird.

           

They are about thirty-eight centimeters tall and medium-sized. It is brown and gray and paler on the head and neck. They’re also a little bit browner on the wings. They let volcanic ash heat their eggs. There aren’t many feathers around the eyes, so you can see their red skin. They also have a crest on their nega.

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They hunt small animals and live in broadleaved forests. It also needs places with nothing covering the ground so they can get small animals and fruits out of the ground. They search for their mate by singing a duet. They are only found in Niuafo’ou and Fanualei.

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There are about six hundred fifty mature of them. All of them estimates out to about nine-hundred seventy. The population of the Tongan Megapode is declining in Niuafo’u, but the population in Fanualei is steady. They might be getting eaten by wolves or other predators, causing the population to drop.

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Their role in the food web is that they eat small animals, like small lizards or insects, and are eaten by the wild bigger animals there. They dig small holes in the ground and eat small insects, work, small lizards, small fruit, and seeds. On Niuafo’ou they usually compete with wild pigs for food, but on Fanualei they have no predators there so they can just eat anything they want to with no competition.

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People used to harvest the eggs of the Megapode and use them for their own needs. Some wild animals on Niuafo’ou would eat them since they are usually have big bellies. The Megapode usually runs away to evade being eaten, but their eggs can’t run so the eggs usually get eaten.

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Author: Cade H.

Published: 2/14/14

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http://www.birdlife.org/datazone/speciesfactsheet.php?id=126

http://eol.org/pages/1050121/details