Apart from helping birds fly and stuffing pillows there’s not much use for feathers…..or is there? To some, feathers signify power and rank and you can bet that not just any old feather is used when making such a statement. One such bird, the Huia bird, had feathers that could signify such things and were so beautiful that their feathers alone gave them reason to be revered. And that they were, especially by the Maori people, the people indigenous to New Zealand.

The Maori people are still in and around New Zealand but most of them tend to stay near the North Island, because the weather is warmer there. The Huia bird unfortunately, is already extinct. What this bird was mostly known for was its appearance, particularly the fact that the entire bird was black but had white markings on its feathers at the tip of tail. The Huia bird was also highly regarded as being a sexual bird, although this had nothing to do with its actual mating practices. This fact was oddly enough because the female bird had a long, curved beak while the male bird had a shorter, straighter beak. Because the bird was associated with sexuality however, some of the Maori people also thought that owning some of the bird’s feathers would increase their own sexual prowess.

Even though these birds are currently extinct, that doesn’t mean that there aren’t a few feathers still left flying around. And, some of those feathers ended up at a private auction in New Zealand, the tail feathers in fact. When the feathers were put up for auction, it was hoped that they would net at least $400 NZ to $500 NZ. But, the tail feathers actually pulled in much more than that, as they sold for $8,400 NZ, which is about $6,800 USD. The buyer was a family that wished to stay anonymous. Now those are some fancy feathers!