Feather Study

Feathers

1) First, find a feather! Then go to the website “The Bird’s Feather” or www.kidwings.com or find a bird book and read about feathers. Pay special attention to the parts of a feather (sheft, vanes, barbs) and the different kinds of feathers (contour, flight, down, semiplume, filoplume, bristle). Draw your feather in your nature journal (or tape ypur feather into it) and label it’s parts.
2) Look at your feather under a microscope or hand lens and see if you can spot the different parts. In your nature journal draw a picture of what you see and label it.

3) See if you can find examples of the six different kinds of feathers. Look outside, look in a birdcage, or look in a feather pillow or feather duster! Use tape to add them to your science notebook and label them.

4) Then go to owl pages to see a picture of an owl feather. The most unique adaptation of Owl feathers is the comb-like leading edge of the primary wing feathers. With other birds in flight, air rushes over the surface of the wing, creating turbulence, which makes a whooshing noise. With an Owl’s wing, the comb-like feather edge breaks down the turbulence into little groups called micro-turbulences. This helps to muffle the sound of the air rushing over the wing surface and allows the Owl to fly silently.
Silent flight gives Owls the ability to capture prey by stealth, and also allows the Owl to use its hearing to locate potential prey. This adaptation is not present on some Owl species that hunt in the daytime.

5) See if you can write or paint with a feather! Carefully cut the end of a large primary feather on an angle until it comes to a point. Dip the point in ink or paint and write like the old timers! Or dip the softer end in paint and use it as a paintbrush to get some interesting effects. Have fun!