This strange looking bird, that can't fly, and looks like a cross between an emu and a bird of paradise is the Cassowary.

And this man has the unlikely job of collecting its dung... but it's all in a good cause.

The Cassowary is a threatened species. No one knows how many birds are left in the World Heritage tropical rainforest of northern Australia. Their lives are threatened by dogs, cars, feral pigs, the loss of habitat and tuberculosis.

Dr. David Westcott
"There are a lot of reasons for thinking that cassowaries may be in a lot of trouble. They are big birds. There are never many of them in one place. They need rainforest and there's not a lot of rainforest left in Australia"

The Cassowary is not only a local icon, it's extremely important to the regeneration of the rainforest. It is one of the only creatures to disperse large seeds from the tropical plants in its droppings, over a wide area.

And it's these droppings that CSIRO scientist Dr. David Westcott hopes will help him determine how many birds there are and how far they move over a season, as well as knowledge about their mating and breeding patterns.

"Cassowaries are like all vertebrates in that as food passes through the gut it's always scraping off some of the stomach lining and that scrapes off old stomach cells and so it is that DNA in that faeces that we are trying to extract"

The faeces are sent to Dr. David Groth of the Curtin University in Western Australia. He studies the DNA to determine the genetic make-up of the Cassowary. From this he can then tell if the droppings in one area are from a single bird or from a lot of different birds, and this helps scientists to more accurately count the bird population.

Collecting dung may not seem like everybody's ideal job, but by collecting cassowary droppings and studying its DNA, scientists may prevent its extinction which in turn will help the regeneration of our tropical rainforests.