By Helen BriggsBBC News
24 August 2017
Scientists are piecing together clues about the life of the dodo, hundreds of years after the flightless bird was driven to extinction.
Few scientific facts are known about the hapless bird, which was last sighted in 1662.
A study of bone specimens shows the chicks hatched in August and grew rapidly to adult size.
The bird shed its feathers in March revealing fluffy grey plumage recorded in historical accounts by mariners.
Delphine Angst of the University of Cape Town, South Africa, was given access to some of the dodo bones that still exist in museums and collections, including specimens that were recently donated to a museum in France.
Her team analysed slices of bone from 22 dodos under the microscope to find out more about the bird's growth and breeding patterns.
"Before our study we knew very very little about these birds," said Dr Angst.
"Using the bone histology for the first time we managed to describe that this bird was actually breeding at a certain time of the year and was moulting just after that."
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