Elephant bird determined that "Vorombe titan" reached weights of and stood tall, making it the world's largest bird, slightly larger than the much older "Dromornis stirtoni". Elephant birds have been extinct since at least the 17th century. Étienne de Flacourt, a French governor of Madagascar in the 1640s and 1650s, mentions an ostrich-like bird said to inhabit unpopulated regions, though it is unclear whether he was repeating folk tales passed on from generations earlier. In 1659, Flacourt wrote of the "vouropatra – a large bird which haunts the Ampatres and lays eggs like the ostriches; so that the people of these places
Bird Island, Minnesota Bird Island, Minnesota Bird Island is a city on U.S. Route 212 in Renville County, Minnesota, United States. The population was 1,042 at the 2010 census. Bird Island was platted in 1878, and named for a nearby bird sanctuary in a marsh. After the installation of ditches and tile, the area was converted to farmland, erasing the town's namesake. A post office has been in operation at Bird Island since 1878. Bird Island was incorporated in 1881. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , all of it land. As of the census