Birds were the last major group of vertebrates in which poison or venom was identified by scientists, though local people had long known that some birds taste foul and cause numbness if handled.
In 1989, researchers found that the hooded pitohui (pronounced ‘pit-o-weez’) of Papua New Guinea had toxic feathers and skin. Later studies showed that, like poison-dart frogs, the toxicity derives from its diet, in this case beetles.
Four other New Guinean birds are now known to be poisonous – three pitohui species and the blue-capped ifrita.
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More recently the regent whistler and the rufous-naped bellbird were added to the poisonous birds list. They are distinctively plumaged species, whose colours sing out in the half-light of their rainforest home.
Feathers collected from them were key to unlocking their poisonous secret through later laboratory analysis in Denmark.
Both birds contain Batrachotoxin (BTX) in their feathers and bodies. This is a potent nerve poison, best known from the skin of ‘poison dart’ frogs in Central and South America.
And ornithologists think there may be more poisonous birds out there.
Main image: An illustration of the hooded pitohui. © Ruth Lindsay/Getty images
