A 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.
