This is bird note.

The Eurasian hoopoo is a striking cinnamon-colored bird,

with black and white wings and a mohawk.

It breeds in Asia, Africa, and Europe.

And it's not picky when it comes to nesting.

A tree cavity, rock crevice, or termite mound with a hole

will do. Or put out a nest box and the hoopoo will take to it. But you might want to think twice

about doing that when you find out how stinky these birds can be.

When freshly laid, hoopoo eggs smell like, well, eggs.

But soon, the mama bird uses her beak to coat the eggs in a secretion produced in her oil gland that gives the eggs a rotten stink.

The smelly substance has antimicrobial properties that protect the developing embryos from bacterial infections.

As if the smell of rotten eggs wasn't bad enough,

the newly hatched chicks paint the nest cavity with their poop.

It gets messy in there. But the chicks grow up fast.

At just six days old, they can harness the power of their poop. When a predator shows up at the

nest, the chicks turn around and shoot a projectile of poop onto the intruder.

For Bird Note, I'm Michael Stein.