The Poisonous Bird You've Probably Never Heard Of

Most birds are harmless.

This one is poisonous.

In this minisode of Wildly Curious, Katy Reiss and Laura Fawks Lapole dive into one of the strangest birds on Earth: the pitohui, a brightly colored songbird from New Guinea that carries powerful neurotoxins in its skin and feathers.  

The toxin is chemically similar to the same compounds found in some poison dart frogs, making the pitohui one of the very few known poisonous birds in the world. But how does a bird become poisonous in the first place?

🐦 What a pitohui actually looks like

☠️ How this bird stores toxins in its feathers and skin

🪲 The beetles responsible for its poison

🧠 Why scientists think the toxins may help defend against parasites

🤧 Why handling one can cause numbness, sneezing, burning skin, and watery eyes

🌴 Why indigenous communities call them “rubbish birds”

Along the way, the episode explores toxic animals, warning coloration, bird evolution, and the bizarre ecosystems of New Guinea—home to some of the weirdest wildlife on Earth.

If you love birding, ornithology, toxic animals, weird nature facts, or evolutionary biology, this is one bird you’ll never forget.

🎧 Part of our “Animals You’ve Probably Never Heard Of” minisode series.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Well, I guess we don't really do usually updates for these mini sodes because they're so short and it's just like a go for it.

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Yeah, it is it is a go for it. Yeah, typically. Besides just you introing here's our mini sodes. Here is our mini sodes, yeah. That's that's that's that's pretty much it. So the mini sods that we're gonna do this season, remember guys, in previous seasons we do a long episode, short, long, short, alternate because Laura and I are busy people and this allows us to pump out like quality content but without killing us on our normal schedule. So for these mini-series for this season, we're gonna do uh animals you've probably have never heard of. Yeah, I like to think of it as you've probably never heard of me. Yes, hopefully. I mean, not hopefully, but also hopefully.

SPEAKER_01 0:43

Yeah, yeah, I want to surprise some people.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

Yeah, right. Okie dokie. Do you want to go first, Laura then?

SPEAKER_01 0:49

Sure. I'm gonna be so interested to see if you know because I I think I might have heard of two of them, but I knew nothing about them. Okay. And then one of them I've just literally never heard of.

SPEAKER_00 0:58

I'm ready to go.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

So then my first one is the Pitahooey. Pitahoo-e.

SPEAKER_00 1:05

Sounds like a spit.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

Right? But no, it's Pitahooey, but it's P-I-T-O-H-U-I.

SPEAKER_00 1:12

O-H-U-I. Oh, a bird. Oh, oh, oh, oh. This one I do know.

SPEAKER_01 1:17

I do know.

SPEAKER_00 1:17

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Okay. So for all of you that hopefully don't know, hang on, because this is one weird bird. So this guy or gal lives in New Guinea, where lots of strange animals live, because very much like Australia, it's an island, it's been isolated.

SPEAKER_00 1:34

And it can kill you, right? This is the one that can kill this bird that could kill you, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:39

Well, not no, not really. Okay, okay. Okay. There is some weird stuff about it.

SPEAKER_00 1:43

Okay, okay, okay, okay. I think I know what you're talking about now.

SPEAKER_01 1:46

So the Pidahue, there's multiple species of them. There's at least five different ones. Mostly I found my information on the hooded Petoueie, Pidahue. It lives in the forests and the edge habitat of the mountains in the lower foothills there. So it's definitely like a tropical bird. And it's got a really startling appearance. It's got an orange body with black wings, a black head, and a black tail. So, like all of its extremities are black, but with a bright orange body. So very Oreole-like. That's what I was gonna say.

SPEAKER_00 2:14

Yeah, that's the only reason why I remembered as soon as I looked at the picture, I was like, oh yeah, the or the one that looks like an Oreo.

SPEAKER_01 2:19

Yes, and it's in the Oreo family. So the whole thing tracks. Well, it's not a new world, it's an old world or Oreo. Wow, that's a mouthful.

SPEAKER_00 2:28

Wow, I was just gonna say, I was like, I'm glad you said that because you know me being from Western Pennsylvania, I cannot do yeah, I can't do vows, R's, and L's. Like so that yeah, that's a nightmare for me. Old world, I can't.

SPEAKER_01 2:42

Old world Oreo. And even my mouth is like Yeah. It's about the same size as an Oreo or a dove. So it's a fairly large song bird. Males and females look exactly the same, and they do erect a little crest on their head when they're upset. These birds are omnivores that eat insects and fruit, and one of its calls is its name. So we've talked about that in our last section of Mini Sodes is how do these birds get their name? It just says it. It goes, pidahooey.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

That's so cool though. Yeah. It's almost like but one of my favorite birds for a long time, and it still kind of is, is whenever I was in Australia and it's the wampoo fruit duck. And it yeah, and it's because when you're out in the rainforest and it echoes through, it sounds like a little old man in the forest going wompoo. Just way out there, wampoo. It's so funny.

SPEAKER_01 3:30

Good brain feel. But why am I talking about this bird? Like everyone's like, okay, cool, a bird, but there's a reason. It's because it's freaking poisonous.

SPEAKER_00 3:39

Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01 3:40

Um, this is only one of a few poisonous birds, all of which live in New Guinea. So of course Australia, New Guinea, they're like next-door neighbors.

SPEAKER_00 3:49

Um I'm pretty sure they broke apart from each other, too, right? Like one would think. I think so, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:55

This bird produces toxins that are super similar to poison dart frogs. The toxin that it produces is called a bathro bathrocatoxin. Um and gram for gram, bathrocotoxins are one of the most toxic substances on earth. So depending on like just versus other toxins, it's crazy. In this bird, it's found mostly in the skin and the feathers, and it's a type of neurotoxin that, like, poison dart frog-wise, would just straight up kill you. Thankfully, the bird will not, but there is some effects we'll talk about. So, how does it become poisonous? From its food, just like poison dart frog. They eat a type of beetle, and the beetles in New Guinea are super closely related to those found in Central and South America that the poison dart frog eats. So, again, like totally different sides of the world.

unknown 4:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:46

Talk about covergent evolution, eating basically the same kinds of beetles. And the baby birds are not as toxic, showing that this toxin accumulates over time, which tracks for if it's an eaten, like because of what it eats. Yeah. Snakes have been seen though, eating and regurgitating the eggs, which might show that the eggs and the nestlings become slightly toxic from the feathers of the adults. So, like just the fact that they're being sat on by a toxic bird makes the eggs like or pass through the system of a toxic bird. I don't know. Yeah, yeah. Um and it it's still debated. Oh, and the toxin makes them smell bad, like really bad. Like the bird itself just smells like it's still debated whether the toxin is just a random byproduct or if the bird uses it as a defense. Like it might be one of those situations where it's just beneficial, but it was gonna eat these beetles regardless. Yeah. Like whether it's intentional or not, just to figuring out the toxin is less potent than that in the poison dart frog. Probably because poison dart frog eating a beetle, that size is very much closer to a bird eating a beetle. So there's just not as much toxin in their body. Yeah. But the fact that it's in their skin and their feathers does deter external parasites. So perhaps it's not necessarily like a I'm gonna kill you if you eat me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it is a it is helping it survive.

SPEAKER_00 6:13

Yeah, yeah. Not a defense and the typical big predator defense necessarily, but defense for what would typically probably go after it more.

SPEAKER_01 6:23

And like birds can be really, I mean, external parasites can do a big deal on birds. Oh, that's what I'm saying, yeah. Like they suck the blood out and wing my like just weaken them. Plus, the coloring of this bird, I mean, there are plenty of beautiful colored birds, and they don't all mean they're apostomatic, but aposomatic coloring, warning coloring in nature, is often bright colors to show that they are poisonous or venomous. Um is it these colors because it was always gonna be these colors, or is it because it's anyway, indigenous peoples from New Guinea will not eat the bird, or at least without a lot of preparation beforehand. And there have been reports of numbing after handling dead specimens. Another scientist who is netting them reported pain and numbing of the hands. And it's it's said that contact with the birds produces unpleasant tingling, long-lasting numbing, sneezing, burning, and watering eyes. So, like it might not kill you, but it's not a pleasant sensation. You don't want to grab this bird.

SPEAKER_00 7:21

And so this because sneezing, the sneezing seems out of place. You know what I mean? It's yeah, it's like it's like painful. Pepper spray. Yeah, yeah, right? Jeez.

SPEAKER_01 7:29

Right, the you're right. The sneezing doesn't make sense really because uh it's a neurotoxin. You wouldn't think that's a good idea.

SPEAKER_00 7:34

Yeah, yeah, it typically doesn't, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:36

Um and so between the fact that they're basically uh horrible to eat because they would just like make your face go numb. Yeah, jeez. And are like a pepper spray bird, and the fact that they smell bad, indigenous people call them rubbish birds. So I mean they're just they're just a rubbish bird.

SPEAKER_00 7:54

Yeah. To be fair, it's the same thing like up north in Pennsylvania. I didn't grow up eating cat feet fish because you call them trash fish. But down in the south, everybody loves catfish, but no, they're bottom feeders. It's trash fish. You don't eat the trash fish.

SPEAKER_01 8:07

So don't eat the don't eat the trash fish and don't eat the rubbish bird. Yeah. So are there poisonous birds? Yes, there are. There are very few of them, and almost all of them are Pidahoois. And if it's not, it still lives around on that island.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

Yeah. Crazy, crazy. Well, that was a good one. That was a good kick kickoff one.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

I'm gonna hopefully people never heard of a poisonous bird.

SPEAKER_00 8:29

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm gonna, now that we're talking about birds for two seconds, I'm gonna do a pitch because I just bought so the book the before that I've talked about before, The Rise and Fall of Dinosaurs by Steve Bruschetti. I'm so sorry, Steve, if I mispronounced your last name. But his book, The Story of Birds, just came out. It is so good. Again, the rise and fall of dinosaurs is he explains, well, the rise and fall of dinosaurs, but in a very like understandable way. He does a fantastic job of breaking it down. The story of birds literally starts back in the beginning and moves forward so far, so good. So if you guys like birds, the story of birds is out now. Please go by Steve Bruchet, please go check it out because it is it is really, really good. All right, guys, that's it for today's episode. Next week, we will be coming at you with a long episode. Don't ask me what it is, because I don't remember. But next week it'll be like this, which is what Oh, there we go. Okay, okay, okay. All right, so next week we'll be talking about genetics. Um, and that's it. Yeah, okay. Talk to you guys next week. Later, folks.