You don’t have to look at many birds to realize that they are very variable in appearance: hawks look different from hummingbirds, and both look

Let’s talk about bird tongues

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2025-01-13 05:30:06

You don’t have to look at many birds to realize that they are very variable in appearance: hawks look different from hummingbirds, and both look different from peacocks. You can spend a lot of time looking at birds, though, before you realize that they are hiding a lot of variation inside their mouths: long tongues, short tongues, spiky tongues, curly tongues, forked tongues, frayed tongues, brush-like tongues.

Like bird bills, bird tongues are specialized to each particular bird’s way of feeding. Birds that feed on nectar have tongues specifically adapted to nectarivory, often with many little protrusions at the tip of the tongue, giving it a frayed or brush-like appearance. This brushiness increases the surface area of the tongue, making it better at picking up nectar.

Hummingbirds go a slightly different route from other nectarivores. Rather than fraying their tongue into a paintbrush, they split it in two near the tip. That’s right: hummingbirds have forked tongues.