Saber Jagjaw (open species)

Edit 2: I forgot I can just replace the file instead of posting a new image, so that's what I did. Originally my inspiration for them was sabertooth tigers and terror birds, now I went more towards the direction of terror bird and dinosaurs than sabertooth tiger and honestly I might prefer this change overall, they look like weird predatory chickens and I adore that 💜

Funfact about the species: when I was in the early stages of brainstorming for them, I was calling them saberbeaked birds, but I changed that since it felt too on the nose and boring

Edit: my inclusion of flightless birds in my work has been inspired by @Sheather888 , I highly recommend checking out their work! I'll also edit this species a bit, it's been pointed out to me that they look a lot like gravediggers which wasn't my intention and I definitely want them to be more of their own thing. I'll leave this up for now for archival purposes while I re-design the lad :]

Jagjaws are a group of four legged flightless birds. Saber Jagjaw is the biggest of them all. They live in the West-North part of the continent, preferring forests and shrublands as their hunting grounds. They're ambush predators that kill their prey by biting them in the throat, much like sabertooth tiers did.

Saber jagjaws are monogamous and mate for life. They dig burrows in the ground where they lay their eggs.

While not generally social outside of their family groups sometimes multiple families of jagjaws will cooperate together to take down bigger prey.

Adult offspring occassionally visit their parents after leaving the nest.

Design notes:

● They can be based on any bird as long as they're grey or earthy in colour

● Their young are born blind, naked and helpless