[2aUnit5 Two little black birds］小西妈双语工程1909期40Damon Day302

Super Damon

FT Watching birds at the zoo

去圆通山观鸟，准备了一个小册子，明显孩子在找鸟画✓的过程中更专注的进行了观察，很棒！

1 鹤鸵 Cassowary（/ˈkæsəweri/）

These big birds have feathers, but they can't fly—their wings are much too small. But their fluffy feathers help the bird stay dry in the damp rain forest. They also protect the bird's skin from sharp thorns.

With its powerful legs, a cassowary can reach about 30 miles per hour! Each foot also has a dagger-like claw. When the bird feels threatened, one kick can injure a predator.

That strange knob on top of a cassowary's head is called a casque (/kæsk/盔状突 ), or helmet. The hard outside of the casque is made of keratin（/ˈkerətɪn/ 角蛋白）, like your fingernails. Inside, there is a spongy material. No one knows for certain why these birds have a casque, but there are guesses! Perhaps it shows a bird's age, or protects its head as it pushes through tangles of branches.

Two of the three cassowary species have wattles, or bare, fleshy pouches of skin that hang from the neck: southern or double-wattled cassowaries and northern or single-wattled cassowaries. The wattles are brightly colored blue, red, gold, purple, or white, depending on the species or subspecies.

They spend most of their time alone. At breeding time, cassowaries find a mate. The female scrapes a spot in the ground and lays 3 to 5 green eggs. And then she leaves! The male sits on the eggs until they hatch, and takes care of the chicks for nearly a year, teaching them where to find food.

Cassowaries are frugivores that feed on the fruits of several hundred rainforest plants. When a cassowary eats a piece of fruit, the flesh gets digested, but the seed passes through. As the bird wanders the forest, its droppings contain fruit seeds that can grow into trees. This makes cassowaries an important part of their rain forest home!

　　2 鸳鸯 Mandarin Duck

The adult male has a red bill, large white crescent(/ˈkresnt/ 新月形) above the eye and reddish face and "whiskers". The male's breast is purple with two vertical white bars, and the flanks ruddy(/ˈrʌdi/ 红润的，红色的), and he has two orange "sails" at the back (large feathers that stick up like boat sails). The female is similar to the female wood duck, with a white eye-ring and stripe running back from the eye, but is paler below, has a small white flank stripe, and a pale tip to its bill.

Both the males and females have crests, but the purple crest is more pronounced on the male.

边在池塘边观察，宝宝自己把鸟的家画下来，边画边跟我讲，愿意用英文说的感觉真棒！ Mandarins feed by dabbling or walking on land. They mainly eat plants and seeds, especially beech mast. The species will also add snails, insects and small fish to its diet. The diet of mandarin ducks changes seasonally.

In the wild, mandarin ducks breed in densely wooded areas near shallow lakes, marshes or ponds. They nest in cavities in trees close to water and during the spring, the females lay their eggs in the tree's cavity after mating.

In traditional Chinese culture, mandarin ducks are believed to be lifelong couples, unlike other species of ducks. Hence they are regarded as a symbol of conjugal affection and fidelity, and are frequently featured in Chinese art. 3 黑天鹅 Black Swan

The Black swan (Cygnus atratus) is a large waterbird that mostly breeds in the southeast and southwest areas of Australia. The body of an adult Black swan is mostly black, except for its broad white wing tips, visible in flight. Its bill is bright red, having a pale tip and bar, and its feet and legs are grayish-black. Its neck is long (the longest neck amongst swans, relative to its size) and it is curved into an "S"-shape. The males are slightly bigger than the females, and have a longer and straighter beak. Juvenile black swans are grayish-brown with lighter-edged feathers.

A black swan has the longest neck, relative to its size of all swan species.

Black swans are herbivorous, feeding on vegetation both in the water or in pastures or when on farm land. Common aquatic plants they feed on include algae, typha, potamogeton, myriophyllum and ruppia. Occasionally they will eat insects.

Usually the female swan makes a nest from sticks, debris and dead leaves into a mound floating on the water. Males help with incubation. 4 鹈鹕 Pelican

They are characterised by a long beak and a large throat pouch used for catching prey and draining water from the scooped-up contents before swallowing. They have a long neck and short stout legs with large, fully webbed feet.

They have predominantly pale plumage. The bills, pouches, and bare facial skin of all species become brightly coloured before the breeding season.

Pelicans swim well with their strong legs and their webbed feet. They rub the backs of their heads on their preen glands to pick up an oily secretion, which they transfer to their plumage to waterproof it. 5 孔雀 Peafowl

Peacocks are large, colorful pheasants（/ˈfeznt/雉） (typically blue and green) known for their iridescent（ /ˌɪrɪˈdesnt/ 色彩斑斓的） tails. Only males are peacocks. Females are peahens, and together, they are called peafowl.

There are two species of peafowl: the Asiatic peafowl (Pavo)（/ˌeɪʒiˈætɪk/亚洲的） or the Congo peafowl (Afropavo congensis)（ /ˈkɑːŋɡoʊ/刚果 ）. The Congo peafowl is the only member of the pheasant family that originated outside Asia.

（There are two familiar peacock species. The blue peacock lives in India and Sri Lanka, while the green peacock is found in Java and Myanmar（/ˈmiːənmɑːr/缅甸） (Burma /ˈbɜːrmə/ ). A more distinct and little-known species, the Congo peacock, inhabits African rain forests.）

The peacock have long, colorful feathers. The peacock can have up to 150 brightly colored feathers on its tail coverts（/ˈkʌvərt/覆羽）. Peahen have shorter, brown feathers.

These tail feathers, or coverts, spread out in a distinctive train that is more than 60 percent of the bird's total body length and boast（/boʊst/ ） colorful "eye" markings of blue, gold, red, and other hues（/hjuː/色调）.

The large train is used in mating rituals and courtship displays. It can be arched into a magnificent fan that reaches across the bird's back and touches the ground on either side. Females are believed to choose their mates according to the size, color, and quality of these outrageous feather trains.

The male needs his bright feathers to attract a mate, and the female needs to be able to blend in with the bushes so that predators cannot see her while she is incubating her eggs.

Peacocks are ground-feeders（omnivore） that eat insects, plants, and small creatures. In fact, wild peafowl often roost（/ruːst/栖息） in forest trees and gather in groups called parties. 6 Play on the rocks

看了一会鸟，然后突然发现这里一堆的石头，宝宝在这里爬上爬下，一会在爬山，一会在徒步，玩得不亦乐乎，貌似比看动物更有趣。

在地上看到了垃圾，自己捡起来，然后走过去问我是不是recycle，然后把垃圾扔进垃圾桶之后再回来玩。