How many different species of flightless birds are there?
There are five ratites, emu and cassowary of Australia, kiwi New Zealand,ostrich of Africa, and rhea South America. There used to be, in historic times the elephant bird of Madagascar 10 feet high 900 lbs. There are 17 species of penguin, all from the southern hemisphere. The northern most is the Galapagos Penguin from, yep, the Galapagos islands almost on the equator. Those are the groups that are all flightless. In other groups there are individual species that are flightless. There is a flightless grebe, similar to loons in appearance, in South America. There is the TINAMOU family of South America with 46 species,they are closely related to the ratites but look more like quail and some species have never been seen to fly. In 1894 a light house was setup on tiny Stephens Island between the North and South Islands of New Zealand. The keepers cat
