Awesome Nature #8

Toucan
Type: Bird Lives In: Central and South America Conservation Status: Least Concern

These strange-looking creatures have long been my favourite birds and it's not hard to see why! There are around forty different species of Toucan in all, varying in both size and colour, but my favourite, and also probably the best-known species is the one pictured - the Toco Toucan. It lives in South America across much of Brazil with its range also overlapping a few of Brazil's neighbours. Sadly, none of my own trips to Brazil have yielded a sighting of this splendid bird but there's a lot of them out there, mainly in the areas that are seldom touched by mankind (and long may it stay that way). I guess their poor flying ability could be one reason I haven't seen one in the wild but there's plenty about in zoos and the like, even here in the UK, where they can be seen hopping around, passing food to each other, and clunking their giant bills! I'll have to take a trip to the Pantanal one of these days where I might actually spot a few of them (or get eaten by a Jaguar).

Why It Is Awesome: Because they pass berries to each other!