Talk:Late Quaternary prehistoric birds

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Contents 1 Argusianus bipunctatus 2 I feel a list of cryptic birds is needed 3 folk memory? 4 Boobies 5 Over-optimistic list

[edit] Argusianus bipunctatus

I know it's only known from a single feather, but are there published citations claiming that it is a "fictional" species?Dinoguy2 22:50, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

In one of the harshest comments I have ever seen a scientist to publish (J. Field Ornithol. '63(2):231), Ken Parks (who is something of a heavyweight in "cryptid" birds) rips the case for the existence of bipunctatus as a distinct species - which rests on a single paper - to shreds:

"[Sibley & Monroe] have accepted (p. 21) as a valid extinct species Argusianus bipunctatus (Wood) 1871, described from a fragment of primary feather of unknown origin, on which the spotted pattern of the inner webs of A. argus primaries is duplicated on the inner web. They cite a paper by Davison (1983) as having made a case for this feather having originated from Tioman Island, off eastern Malaya. This paper is perhaps the wildest flight of fancy ever to have appeared in a serious ornithological journal--the author also postulates that this mysterious species was flightless! The feather fragment was found in a bundle of feathers of A. argus, and I have seen no admission by any author that the color pattern and the slender shaft may represent nothing more than a developmental accident in an individual of A. argus. Anyone who has handled large numbers of birds has seen feathers that were abnormal both in shape and pigmentation. With no evidence other than this feather fragment, I see no justification for acceptance of A. bipunctatus as a species, much less Davison's conjectures about its supposed range and flightlessness." So, given that the feather was packed for trade with other, normal Argus pheasant ones, there is no real reason to assume that bipunctatus ever was anything than a single aberrant feather on an otherwise normal bird which was shot and plucked for the millinery trade.

Thanks btw for the Chendytes article! -- Dysmorodrepanis

Sounds good to me, just got suspicious seeing it on so many extinct/threatened bird listings.65.41.245.163 03:50, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

It's a kind of Internet urban legend. Basically, it's mysterious, it's sexy (this is an argus pheasant we're talking about, not some plain old "little brown job"), it might once have existed (if you have never actually seen the specimen and know something about how feathers are made - then, however, it tells the whole story, pattern, slender shaft and all: it's basically almost-a-vane mirrored, which can happen by a simple developmental aberration), it received some kind of legitimacy by Sibley & Monroe, and there you have it. The issue has been settled in Threatened Birds of the World as far as science/conservation biology goes, but the legend lives on.

I'd rather like to see all that effort dedicated to finding out what the kondlo actually was - the cryptid ground-bird of Zululand. Described to be like a guineafowl or horn-raven, but distinct; the name is not Zulu, but what is it? -- Dysmorodrepanis 15:25, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] I feel a list of cryptic birds is needed

Likes of Dysmorodrepanis, Nechisar Nightjar etc.

Dysmorodrepanis is entirely valid, only it was rarely seen in its lifetime: [1]. Nechisar Nightjar, Hirundo perdita etc - true, they do not belong in the extinct birds list (like for example the Bogota Sunangel, which is "mysterious" and probably extinct). The appropriate subsection would be rare and endangered species. If you like to start, let me know, I'll gladly throw in taxa I know of. Dysmorodrepanis 23:19, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for a link! Still, not everybody accepts Dysmorodrepanis:

Later chapter of extinct birds in HBW (which for many ornithologists is THE reference) calls it hypothetical. BirdLife and "Threatened Birds of the World" has it's own view on many species - generally accepts all hypothetical species: Argusianus bipuncatus, several macaws from Carribean etc.

So separate list is needed:

Birds very little known and ones which validity is controversial. It is independent from their status as safe, endangered, possibly extinct or recently extinct. It would list species mostly accepted, errorenously rejected and those which become forgotten. I don't know appropriate name: List of controversial birds? Cryptic birds - perhaps not? List of mysterious birds?

I mean taxa like above, omitting many poorly differentiated subspecies and fantastic cryptids like kongamato.

Jurek

Use the category tag Category:Controversial birds - it is exactly what is needed for this purpose! See the description on that page for details. Whether to make a list (which would be divided into sections like "uncertain taxonomic status", "possibly extinct", "known only from very few specimens" etc) should be reserved for later, as these taxa unfortunately don't seem to have much appeal and/or information to create good articles (in pre-Wikipedia times, I once spent some months to make a list of all such taxa from the Peters checklist... I still have it around, but it needs massive reworking of course since much information in Peters is from the 1930s).

So I suggest we start to fill up the category first and once there is enough articles there (say, some dozens), we can make the list. The category is the product of one of the guys from Wikiproject Birds, so it is kinda official. Dysmorodrepanis 13:02, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] folk memory?

The article claims, but does not back up, that some of these birds were known by folk memory. It would be nice if this could be expanded on. Perhaps information is available in individual articles? Martijn Faassen 21:12, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

That apparently is the way it is intended. See Harpagornis. Changed article accordingly. And good thing too, because the Eagle's story is usually much bowdlerized in today's "folk memory".

These stories I know of are usually assorted odds and ends. For example, the folk memory "moa" is apparently a composite. The Chatham Islands "Kiwi" and probably "Kakapo" were different species. Those taxa that "may have survived until historic times" usually have either folk memory or early traveller's notes assigned to them. The Teratornis has quite some discussion onn the matter. As this here article grows, it could eventually be split into a list or dealt with some other way to expand the text section. Dysmorodrepanis 06:25, 30 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Boobies

In Steadman's 2006 book, Extinction and Biodiversity of Tropical Pacific Birds (which is incidentally very good) the Ua Huka Booby, Papasula abbotti costelloi has a different common name, the Abbott and Costello Booby. I wonder if there is enough information on the subspecies (or perhaps species) to have its own article, just because the whole idea behind the naming is so marvelously daft. Sabine's Sunbird talk 04:15, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

After Christmas I guess I will have enough info grins. A discussion of prehistoric distribution of the species as a whole should be in order also, there was some discussion I had with some extinct bird folks about the possibility of another extinct ssp (Mascarenes population).

Many vernacular names are tentative because there is not one single naming convention of Late Quaternary prehistoric forms save that people generally like them to have vernacular names. I decided to play it safe and use geographical descriptors if none existed. Dysmorodrepanis 09:18, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Over-optimistic list

This list includes many birds which don't appear in standard reference books of birds. I feel it is based on preliminary and controversial research. Particilarly a huge number of often unnamed rails and crakes is controversial - looks like somebody asssumed that every bone of the bird not currently found on a tropical island means new extinct and endemic species. (Unsigned comment by 131.152.84.114.

No, its the work of more specialised journals, and books and other literature. And the rail thing is actually conservative, estimates in journals of rail species on islands prior to man are somewhere in the region of 700-1700 species. In truth, there are still known undescribed living species out there, so the fact that they haven't been described yet doesn't make them invalid. Sabine's Sunbird talk 19:43, 14 February 2007 (UTC)