BirdNote®: Melanin Makes Feathers Stronger
Air Date: Week of October 17, 2025
Herring gulls have black tipped wings rich in melanin. (Photo: Marie-Lan Taÿ Pamart, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0)
Birds as different as gulls, pelicans, storks, and flamingos all have black-tipped wings. These flight feathers are rich in a pigment called melanin. BirdNote®’s Michael Stein reports that melanin doesn’t just provide color – it also helps make feathers stronger.
Transcript
CURWOOD: It’s Living on Earth, I’m Steve Curwood.
DOERING: And I’m Jenni Doering.
[BIRDNOTE THEME]
DOERING: From the classic witch to Batman to Wednesday Addams, dressing in all black is a Halloween staple. But for many birds, black is more than just a fashion statement. Here’s BirdNote®’s Michael Stein to explain.
BirdNote®
Melanin Makes Feathers Stronger
Written by Conor Gearin
[Ring-billed Gull calls]
If you take a look at birds’ wings, you might notice a pattern. Many species have black feathers on the trailing edge of their wings, regardless of what color most of their feathers are. Birds as different as gulls, pelicans, storks, and flamingos all have black-tipped wings.
[American Flamingo flock calls]
These flight feathers are rich in a pigment called melanin. But melanin doesn’t just provide color. It also helps make feathers stronger. Feathers with melanin have a tougher layer of keratin — the same substance found in human fingernails — compared to feathers without. So the black feathers actually help protect a wing from wear and tear.
That’s especially useful on the edge of a birds’ wing, where air is rushing past during flight. Melanin helps the wing stay aerodynamic and efficient for birds so they can gather food, escape from predators, and complete their long migratory journeys.

Pictured above is a Red-necked Phalarope. The black pigment in its wings helps strengthen its feathers. (Photo: Andreas Trepte, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.5)
[Red-necked Phalarope flock calls]
While it takes energy to produce melanin, it saves birds the trouble of replacing feather after feather when traveling thousands of miles.
[Red-necked Phalarope flock calls]
I’m Michael Stein.
###
Senior Producer: Mark Bramhill
Producer: Sam Johnson
Managing Editor: Jazzi Johnson
Content Director: Jonese Franklin
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Ring-billed Gull ML214918231 recorded by Jeff Ellerbusch, American Flamingo ML172484 recorded by Gerrit Vyn, and Red-necked Phalarope ML103332941 recorded by Andrew Spencer.
BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
© 2022 BirdNote March 2022 / 2025
Narrator: Michael Stein
ID# feather-08-2023-03-23 feather-08
Reference:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/241372715_Melanin_and_the_Abra…
https://academy.allaboutbirds.org/how-birds-make-colorful-feathers/
https://www.audubon.org/news/what-makes-bird-feathers-so-colorfully-fab…
https://europepmc.org/article/cba/607575
DOERING: For pictures of these black feathered birds, migrate on over to the Living on Earth website, loe.org.
Links
Living on Earth wants to hear from you!
Living on Earth
62 Calef Highway, Suite 212
Lee, NH 03861
Telephone: 617-287-4121
E-mail: comments@loe.org
Newsletter [Click here]
Donate to Living on Earth!
Living on Earth is an independent media program and relies entirely on contributions from listeners and institutions supporting public service. Please donate now to preserve an independent environmental voice.
NewsletterLiving on Earth offers a weekly delivery of the show's rundown to your mailbox. Sign up for our newsletter today!
Sailors For The Sea: Be the change you want to sea.
The Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment: Committed to protecting and improving the health of the global environment.
Contribute to Living on Earth and receive, as our gift to you, an archival print of one of Mark Seth Lender's extraordinary wildlife photographs. Follow the link to see Mark's current collection of photographs.
Buy a signed copy of Mark Seth Lender's book Smeagull the Seagull & support Living on Earth