An expectant father never leaves the nest with unhatched eggs, not even to eat or drink. He even enters a strange state where he doesn’t even need to go to the bathroom until the eggs hatch. Once they do, dad spends the next nine months raising and defending his chicks.

Cassowaries are shy and reclusive animals, but once they are threatened and cornered, they become aggressive. Wildlife biologists consider them as the world’s most dangerous bird. When threatened, they strike back with powerful head-butts and pecks; they even have a powerful claw in their inner toe which can slice open a human belly or throat.

Cassowaries are part of the flightless and mostly long-legged ratite family. This means that they are the cousins of emus, rheas, ostriches, and kiwi. They are also cousins of the extinct moas and elephant birds.