THE INCUBATOR BIRD by Jobe Martin’s “The Evolution of a CREATIONIST” : Biblical Discipleship Publishers. TX.
The Megapode, or “Incubator Bird” of Australia is unique among birds. This three to four pound bird resembles a chicken or a small turkey, in fact some Aussies call it the brush turkey.
The incubator birds are so UNLIKE all other birds. So, if the evolved, from WHAT did they evolve from? Or what are they EVOLVING into? An article in Scientific American *
- Roger S. Seymour, “The Brush Turkey,” Scientific American, Vol 265, No 6. December 1991, pp 108-114 offers precious little by the way of an evolutionary explanation for the origins of this strange bird.
- “Instead, they pile up great heaps of debris which serve a incubators; the warmth of the fermenting compost does the work. In one species, the scrub fowl, a mound 20 feet high and 50 feet wide has been reported.” Roger Tory Peterson, Life nature Library: The Birds {N.Y>-Time-life books, 1973, p. 140.
Instead of using its own body heat to incubate its eggs( as does the chicken who sits on her eggs), the incubator bird uses fermentation heat, and “some use solar heat and others the heat produced by volcanic action.The New Encyclopedia Britannica Vol 7. (Chicago University 1990,edition p.101.
OK! A bird that uses volcanic heat for warmth or fermenting plant life to hatch its eggs: incredible! If there are any creatures that could NOT POSSIBLY evolve, the Australian Incubator Bird joins the Bombardier Beetle as such a creature.
The female, is responsible for two, only activities. First, she must test the nest to be sure it is adequate for the ability to incubate her eggs.What explanation can evolution offer for the ability of the hen to evaluate the suitability of a nest that may be dug three feet into the ground and extend 15 feet or more above the ground and up to 50 feet across? Plus what would motivate a little three and one-half pound male bird to get busy constructing such a monstrous nest and number two, should the hen reject his first effort?
After accepting the nest, the second responsibility of the female is preformed. she lays 20 t0 35 eggs at the rate of one every three days for up to seven months. “As many as 16 eggs can exist in a normal mound at any one time” Ibid Seymour, p. 109.
Each egg wights about half a pound and is as large as an Ostrich egg! That’s a tremendous amount of work for a tree to four pound hen. No wonder that upon completion of her laying task, she leaves the nest, never to return. She takes no part in the incubation nor of the raising of her chicks. This is not the “NORMAL ” evolutionary way!
At this point the male begins to preform his God-given job of managing the incubation of the deeply buried eggs. For this species of incubator bird chicks to survive, they demand a precise temperature of 91 F. YES, exactly 91 Degrees F. If the male wants the chicks to survive, he will not let the temperature vary more than two degrees on either side of 91 degrees K How does the daddy bird maintain a consistent temperature of 91 degrees F in a mound of decaying plants and dirt?
Scientists differ in the mechanism, they think the bird uses to measure the temperature. Some think that bird’s thermometer is in its beak. Others believe the tongue can detect the 91 degree F and few tenths of percent above and below that point.
BUT, here’s the point that must be asked. “How could this bird possibly have evolved to know about this critical temperature range and not have its chicks perish and evolution stop for this bird? Dead creatures do not continue to evolve, do they?
So how does the male do all this? Well the male digs down into the nest and checks the temperature. On hot days, he may pile extra sand on top of the nest to shield it from the sun. He may even rearrange the entire pile of rotting leaves and grasses several times a day.
On cooler days, the male megapode ( meaning big feet) will push off material from the top of the nest to permit more sunlight to penetrate the decaying materials. Or, to keep the humidity at 99.5% around the eggs, he may dig conical holes towards the eggs to get more moisture deeper into the nest. Keeping temperature and humidity just right is a big job. Concerning the precision needed for incubation temperature maintenance, Seymour write: “This process is very precise: one centimeter of fresh material added to the mound can increse core temperature about 1 1/2 Degree C. IBID seymour P. 1
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