Southern Ostrich

     The Southern Ostrich, also known as the South-African Ostrich or the Black-Necked Ostrich, is one of the 4 species of Ostriches. It’s found mainly in  South Africa, Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Angola and Botswana. The Southern ostrich is the most abundant ostrich species as it’s widely farmed for its meat, eggs and feathers. 

     The Southern ostrich has a blue neck like the Somali Ostrich which it closely resembles. But differs mainly in having small feathers on its head. The Southern ostrich has also loose, soft, and smooth feathers which is black with white primaries and tail in males, and grey brown with white primaries in females.

     As other ostrich species, the top hen lay her creamy white eggs first then other females put their eggs in her nest. After that she discards the extra eggs from the nest and gives hers the priority. In most cases the nest doesn’t contain more than 20 eggs although every hen can lay 7 – 10 eggs. The male Southern ostrich usually incubates eggs during the night shift and the female does the incubation during the day shift. The chicks hatch almost after 35 – 45 days and are reared by both males and females. They reach the size of their parents almost after 6 months and reach sexual maturity between 2 – 4 years.