Difference between birds and mammals.

Birds and mammals have common roots - the class of Reptiles, but due to a number of morphological and anatomical differences, these animals were able to master different living spaces.

Definition

Birds - it is a biological taxon, class. They belong to the type of Chordates, the kingdom of the Animals. As a typical representative of the class, you can name a crow, chicken, sparrow, penguin or peacock.

Mammals are a biological taxon. The class Mammals belongs to the Chordate type, the Animal Kingdom. Typical members of the class are hares, lions, cows, dolphins, and walruses.

Comparison

Birds have a number of characteristics that allowed them to be combined into one taxon. They are vertebrates like fish and tetrapods. They are warm-blooded, like mammals, and oviparous, like reptiles. A unique feature of these animals is the adaptation of the body to flight: it is covered with feathers, the upper limbs are modified into wings. A separate "pride" of birds is the beak, which no other species of Chordates has.

Swallow. The class of birds

All mammals have a number of features that made it possible to distinguish them into one class. The first animals - platypuses and vipers - are a little "lagging behind" in some indicators from their colleagues. But if you do not return to echidnas and platypuses every time, then all mammals are warm-blooded. Just like birds. Most mammals are covered with hair or hair. They are engaged in live birth and feed their young with milk using modified sweat glands.

The anatomical structure of birds is adapted to their ability to fly. Even those birds that do not fly today once possessed this skill. Rather, not they, but their distant ancestors. The anatomical structure of a mammal depends on the environment in which it lives.

The skeleton of birds is simplified, strengthened and lightened. The bones of the skull are fused. They do not have prominent cranial sutures. In the spine, four sections are distinguished, three of which have grown together. The bird's neck is long and mobile. The belt of the forelimbs changed into wings, while some of them were reduced and merged. Only birds have a keel interlocked with ribs.

The skeleton of a mammal is represented by five sections (the sacral one is absent only in cetaceans). The skull of these animals is large, its bones have grown together, forming a protection for a developed brain.

Lev. Class mammals

In the digestive system of birds, the absence of teeth, an underdeveloped rectum and a high rate of metabolic processes are noted.

The bird's respiratory system is adapted to increased gas exchange. In addition to the lungs, they have pulmonary sacs, thanks to which birds have "double breathing". In mammals, the respiratory system is represented by the lungs with bronchi. The diaphragm is involved in breathing.

The circulatory system of the bird is represented by two circles of blood circulation and a four-chambered heart. The pulse of a bird in flight can reach a thousand (!) Beats per minute. Mammals also have two circles of blood circulation and a four-chambered heart, but only their blood contains highly specialized non-nuclear cells - erythrocytes.

Birds have well developed eyesight, but no sense of smell. They do not distinguish between smells. Some birds have a marked intelligence. All the senses are developed in animals and intellectual abilities are noted.

About 9800 bird species live on Earth. They inhabit all continents and parts of the world, except for the central part of Antarctica. There are about 5000 species of mammals on the planet. They are common in all parts of the world, except for the interior of Antarctica, deep ocean trenches and airspace.

Conclusions TheDifference.ru

  1. Most birds are adapted to fly, unlike most animals. Only birds have wings.
  2. Birds are oviparous, animals are viviparous, except for the first animals.
  3. Birds are covered with feathers, animals - with wool.
  4. The number of bird species prevails over the number of mammalian species.
  5. Unlike birds, mammals feed their young with milk produced by the mammary glands of females.
  6. Birds lack teeth, animals have them and are highly differentiated.
  7. Birds have four sections of the spine, and mammals have five.
  8. The respiratory system of birds has lungs and a pulmonary sac, allowing for "double breathing". In mammals, breathing is carried out by the lungs with the bronchi using the diaphragm.
  9. The pulse rate of a bird is higher than the pulse rate of a mammal, but only in mammals nuclear-free erythrocytes “work” in the blood.
  10. In addition to those systems that facilitate flight, birds have a lower level of organization of the organ systems than mammals.
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