Culmen (bird)

The beak, bill, or rostrum is an external anatomical structure of birds that is used for eating and for grooming, manipulating objects, killing prey, fighting, probing for food, courtship and feeding young. The terms beak and rostrum are also used to refer to a similar mouth part in some dicynodonts, Ornithischians, cephalopods, cetaceans, billfishes, pufferfishes, turtles, Anuran tadpoles and sirens.

Although beaks vary significantly in size, shape, color and texture, they share a similar underlying structure. Two bony projections—the upper and lower mandibles—are covered with a thin keratinized layer of epidermis known as the rhamphotheca. In most species, two holes known as nares lead to the respiratory system.

Although the word beak was, in the past, generally restricted to the sharpened bills of birds of prey, in modern ornithology, the terms beak and bill are generally considered to be synonymous. The word, which dates from the 13th century, comes from the Middle English bec, which itself comes from the Latin beccus.

Although beaks vary significantly in size and shape from species to species, their underlying structures have a similar pattern. All beaks are composed of two jaws, generally known as the upper mandible (or maxilla) and lower mandible (or mandible). The upper, and in some cases the lower, mandibles are strengthened internally by a complex three-dimensional network of bony spicules (or trabeculae) seated in soft connective tissue and surrounded by the hard outer layers of the beak. The avian jaw apparatus is made up of two units: one four-bar linkage mechanism and one five-bar linkage mechanism.

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