Some Morphological Studies on the Spinal Cord of Ostrich

Abstract

The African ostrich is a flightless bird found ''r ly in open area of Africa. Its the largest living bird related to ratite family which characteristic than the other birds by large body, very long neck, the wings in relation to the bird size are small and very strong hind limb it is the faster runner in two legs Deeming (1999). In Egypt in the early 20th century, ostrich ''Lrming was very important for production of ostrich· feathers and documents were produced to perfect the art of procuring the plumes from the birds and subsequently processing them. Pharaohs used ostrich feathers for adornment Cooper, Mahrose, EI-Shafei and Marai (2008) Ostrich is abundant and broadly distributed in Egypt not only in the present but also in the past Manlius, N (2001). In the present time ostrich meat get high palatability to consumers at which 12 of provinces Of 43 in Egypt were featured in 2003-2004 as farming ostriches. Egypt has nume.rous strengths and opportunities to develop its ostrich sector Cooper, et al. (2008)

In spite of this the ostrich has not received thadequate attention in anatomy when compared with the other birds. The amount of rc :earch which can be traced in the available literature on the ostrich is relatively few. So the present study select the subject of the spinal cord as a part of central controlling system to give some anatomical information some what explaining the peculiar features of this bird (faster runner in two leg) depending in the relation between the spinal cord ,;;Jlargement to the function of the limbs. The aim of this work to study the morphological structures of the spinal cord and its meninges, and apply some morphometeric features on the spinal cord. Showing the relation between the vertebrae and spinal cord.