Oʻahu Nukupuʻu

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Oahu Nukupu'u

Nukupu'u
Hemignathus lucides

Conservation status

Critically endangered

Scientific classification

Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Passeriformes
Family:	Drepanididae
Genus:	Hemignathus
Species:	H. lucidus lucidus

Binomial name

Hemignathus lucidus lucides
Lichtenstein, 1839

The Oahu Nukupu’u was a species of Nukupu’u that was similar to its cousins from the Islands of Kauai and Maui. The males were mostly yellow with that color spread across the belly and on the head. As you got to the wings they turn from yellow to olive green. It lores were a shade of black and the legs were also black. The females and the young had similar coloration except that there was less yellow and the yellow they had was more dull then the males. They had a long decurved bill that would reach about one and a half inches in length. The upper bill was twice as long as the lower one, which was designed to pluck out the insects from the tube that was made into the bark that was made by the lower bill.

It mostly feed on insects in which it found underneath the barks of certain trees. These trees include the Koa and O’hia which attract large amounts of insects because of their nectar filled flowers. It feeds on Koa in High Elevation Forests and fed on O’hia in Low elevations. In rare cases it feed on the nectar of the O’hia flowers.

The Oahu Nukupu’u was last collected in 1837 when Mr. Deppe shot several specimens in the Nuuanu Valley where it was seen feeding on the nectar of several flowers in a plantation. Afterward though, it was never collected but from Perkins, we see that it was still existent in the 1860s. When searches for the species were issued in the 1880s, no specimens ever turned up.

Today we no longer can see the Oahu Nukupu’u in the wild. Instead we can only see it as a few specimens that ere collected over the coarse of the years. It was believed to have vanished as the spread of disease occurred, killing off Nukupu’u populations across the island. Mongoose and rats were released onto the island and were suspected to be predators that stole chicks from nests, causing the quota increase from chicks to drop.