At 12:08 AM 18/09/2002 +1000, you wrote:
At 19:45 17/09/2002 +1000, Richard wrote:
The bush thick knees are regularly sunbaking in their favourate spot in
the Brisbane
Botanical Gardens - one was kneeling yesterday, which was an interesting
sight
given their backwards facing knees ****This is an interesting anatomical
issue, Lawrie. Technically "thick-knees" should be called
"thick-ankles". Those backward facing "knees" are actually their ankles,
and bend as ankles normally do - as is the case for all birds. Their
knees are high up under their feathers and bend forwards in the normal
way. Birds walk on their toes, and what appear to be their legs (and are
usually referred to as their legs, eg "long-legged","leg-colour", etc)
are actually their tarsi (the equivalent of the long bones in our own feet).
But I guess Bush Thick-ankle is a little foreign-sounding, isn't it?
Regards. Richard
PS Your bird in the Botanical Gardens was actually standing on its
heels, ie on it's entire "foot", rather than just its toes, when you saw it.
To be absolutely correct, the bare part of a bird's leg is its
tarso-metatarsus.
The small ankle bones, the tarsals, are normally in tow rows but in birds
those in
the upper row have fused to the tibia to make a tibio-tarsus,
and those in the lower row have fused to the metatarsus, to make a
tarso-metatarsus.
Cheers
Peter
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