Watch out above: This bird poops every 10 minutes, scientists say

Bird watching is the passion of many, though few are paid to do it. One such person is Leo Uesaka, a biologist at the University of Tokyo who made a less-than-pleasant discovery while observing Streaked Shearwaters, a seabird found along the Japanese coast. According to Scientific American, inspiration struck during a beach trip, leading Uesaka to his next research project.

After setting up a camera to study the birds’ behavior, he discovered that they defecate between 4 and 10 minutes, and relative to their body size, the droppings were substantial. Each release amounted to about five percent of the bird’s body mass.

In a paper published in Current Biology earlier this month, Uesaka reported his findings after capturing more than 30 hours of footage of 15 different Streaked Shearwaters. One of the key takeaways focused on the birds’ fecal habits. The data was collected by strapping cameras to the birds, and over the course of nearly three dozen hours, “a total of 195 excretions were observed,” he wrote. The birds were remarkably consistent in their timing: all but one incident occurred mid-flight, and almost never immediately after takeoff.

The research wasn’t solely aimed at understanding the birds’ digestive habits—it also explored how these behaviors impact the broader marine ecosystem they’re part of.

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