Bermuda Night Heron
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Bermuda Night Heron | ||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Conservation status | ||||||||||||||
| Scientific classification | ||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||
| Binomial name | ||||||||||||||
| Nyctanassa carcinocatactes (Olson & Wingate 2006) |
||||||||||||||
| Synonyms | ||||||||||||||
|
Nycticorax carcinocatactes |
The Bermuda Night Heron (Nyctanassa carcinocatactes) is an extinct heron species from Bermuda. It is sometimes assigned to the genus Nycticorax. It was first described in 2006 by Storrs L. Olson and David B. Wingate from subfossil material found in the Pleistocene and Holocene deposits in caves and ponds of Bermuda. Its anatomy was rather similar to its next living relative, the Yellow-crowned Night Heron (Nyctanassa violacea) but it had a heavier bill, a more massive skull and more robust hindlimbs. The specialization of the bill and the hindlimbs showed that it was apparently adapted to the feeding on land crabs. There are also early historian reports referring to that species. It became possibly extinct due to the settlement of the Bermuda islands in the 17th century.
[edit] References
 |
This Ciconiiformes-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
