Tag Archives: Extinction

EXTINCT SPECIES: Preserved moa remains provide a small glimpse into the life of the giant flightless bird

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Image via Google Books

Just like the preserved head of an upland moa (Megalapteryx didinus), the foot of the now extinct, giant flightless Moa (Megalapteryx), which was once endemic to New Zealand, was probably found in a cave, where a cool and dry environment mummified the remains. More via the Te Ara Encyclopedia of New Zealand:

This head of an upland moa (Megalapteryx didinus) was found in the 19th century in a cave near Cromwell, in Central Otago. It had been mummified by the dry, cold conditions of the cave. Unlike most other moa species, the upland moa had a sharp beak, and the comparative size of the eye sockets and nose suggest that its sense of smell was better than its eyesight.

Complete moa eggs have been found, and the image below shows a moa egg next to an ostrich egg. Moa feathers have also been recovered. In fact, DNA has been extracted from these feathers and used to reconstruct what some species of moa looked like, and results reveal that “their brown and white-tipped feathers combined to form obfuscating patterns of camouflage that would have protected them from predators, like the giant Haast’s Eagle.”

Image via ryanfb on Flickr

Image via the Te Ara Encyclopedia of New Zealand

Image via Curious Expeditions on Flickr


The authors or licensors of these images from Flickr do not endorse my work or me and their images are protected under an attribution license.

On the Net:

  1. Moa Sightings
  2. Fossil Feathers Revealing Extinct Moa’s True Colors

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MEGAFAUNA: Cave painting may illustrate giant extinct flightless bird that roamed Australia around 40,000 years ago

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Cave painting image by Ben Gunn found here and here. Pencil drawing of Genyornis newtoni by Nobu Tamura found here

Researchers believe that this cave painting may depict Genyornis—a giant flightless bird that roamed Australia “until their sudden disappearance [4]0,000 years ago, about the same time that humans arrived in Australia.” Today, the only large flightless birds that inhabit Australia are the emu (Dromaius novaehollandiae) and the southern cassowary (Casuarius casuarius). Feral ostriches occur in Australia too. More via GrrlScientist and ABC Darwin:

Archaeologist Ben Gunn said the giant birds became extinct more than 40,000 years ago.

“The details on this painting indicate that it was done by someone who knew that animal very well,” he said.

He says the detail could not have been passed down through oral storytelling.

“If it is a Genyornis, and it certainly does have all the features of one, it would be the oldest dated visual painting that we’ve got in Australia,” he said.

“Either the painting is 40,000 years old, which is when science thinks Genyornis disappeared, or alternatively the Genyornis lived a lot longer than science has been able to establish.”

Mr Gunn says there are paintings of other extinct animals right across the area including the thylacine, or tasmanian tiger, the giant echidna and giant kangaroo.

“It does give you a window back to a time that you can pinpoint, and in the case of the Genyornis it’s a very long picture,” he said.

The traditional owners of the land in the Northern Territory say they are excited the painting could be Australia’s oldest dated rock art.

On the Net:

  1. Ancient Diets Of Australian Birds Point To Big Ecosystem Changes

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REDISCOVERED SPECIES: Sibree’s dwarf lemur rediscovered

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This species of lemur was discovered more than a 100 years ago but was thought extinct due to deforestation, which is a big problem in Madagascar. More on the discovery from Scientific American:

Scientists have long believed that the Sibree’s dwarf lemur (Cheirogaleus sibreei) went extinct following the destruction of its only known forest habitat. But a few years ago Mitchell Irwin of McGill University in Montreal and his research team encountered some dwarf lemurs that didn’t quite look the way they expected the species to appear. Two lemurs were caught, their DNA tested, and the Sibree’s dwarf lemur was revealed.

This is actually the first confirmation that the Sibree’s lemur is truly its own species. The species looks almost identical to the Crossley’s dwarf lemur (C. melanotis), with which it shares its habitat. The research proving its morphological uniqueness was published online March 6 in the journal Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution.

More via PhysOrg.com:

The  was first discovered in Madagascar in 1896, but this tiny, nocturnal dwarf lemur was never studied throughout the 20th century. Following the destruction of its only known rainforest habitat, scientists had no idea whether the species still existed in the wild – or even whether it was a .

.       .       .

This work led to the further surprise that two morphologically distinct dwarf lemur species were present, living side-by-side. Further work by geneticist Linn Groeneveld, German Primate Center confirmed the existence of the more common Crossley’s dwarf lemur, and the elusive Sibree’s dwarf lemur.

The new study showed the mystery lemurs to be very similar to the only known specimen of Sibree’s dwarf lemur, now in The Natural History Museum in London, England.  shows the mystery lemurs to be highly distinct from all other known species. In fact, the genetic analyses confirmed that of the four known dwarf lemur species, this is the most genetically unique and probably closely resembles the ancestor that gave rise to the other species.

Image showing historical deforestation rates of Madagascar was found here

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IVORY-BILLED WOODPECKER story as told by Sufjan Stevens

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Only Sufjan Stevens can write a song about an esoteric subject like the supposed rediscovery of the ivory-billed woodpecker, which “decide[d] to come back even if only for a glimpse.”

More via NPR:

Independent radio producers Dan Collison and Elizabeth Meister were curious about how Stevens writes his songs, which, much like their own work, are filled with stories of places and people. So, they introduced Stevens to the Arkansas town of Brinkley.

Brinkley is a small farming town not far from where the ivory-billed woodpecker recently was rediscovered. News that the bird is not extinct has brought a ray of hope to the residents of Brinkley.

Producers Collison and Meister spoke with people in the town, then shared the interviews with Stevens. He wrote a song about the ivory-bill, known as the “lord god” or “great god” bird because of its breathtaking appearance. Together, they offer a portrait of Brinkley in word and song.

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REDISCOVERED SPECIES: Species of buttonquail thought extinct rediscovered in the Philippines

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Image Found Here

worcesters-buttonquail1A species of buttonquail — Worcester’s buttonquail (Turnix worcesteri) — has been rediscovered. The bird was rediscovered in a market where it was being sold as bushmeat. The little qual is endemic to the island of Luzon in the Philippines.  Hunters had snared the bird, and it later turned up in the market where it was photographed.

This species of buttonquail “was previously only known through drawings based on dead museum specimens.” The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species lists the Worcester’s buttonquail as “Data Deficient.” The IUCN Red List also states that “buttonquails are a notoriously cryptic and unobtrusive family of birds, and the species could conceivably occur in reasonable numbers somewhere, [and] if it does inhabit grasslands, it cannot be assumed that increases in this habitat on Luzon have benefited the species, which may prove to have specific ecological requirements not met by the creation of pastures or cropland through forest clearance.” More from the Telegraph.co.uk, United Kingdom

“This is a very important finding,” said Philippines-based Arne Jensen, a Danish ornithologist who heads the bird club’s records committee.

“Once you don’t see a bird species in a generation, you start to wonder if it’s extinct, and for this bird species we simply do not know its status at all.”

The quail’s breeding area remains unknown, though ornithologists suspect it resides in the high mountain grasslands of the Cordillera mountain range to the west of the Caraballos on the main island of Luzon.

Records indicate that the quail, which was named after Dean Conant Worcester, an American zoologist who worked in the Philippines in the early 20th century, was being sold at a Manila wet market in 1902. Since then, just a few single specimens have been documented in Nueva Vizcaya and Benguet provinces, which form part of the two mountain ranges, the club said.