Gallirallus
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| Gallirallus | ||||||||||||
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 Weka, Gallirallus australis
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11-12 living, 3-5 recently extinct, and see text |
Gallirallus is a genus that contains about a dozen living species of rails that live in the Australasian-Pacific region. Many of these, including the most well-known one - the bold and inquisitive weka of New Zealand - are flightless or nearly so; others, such as the Buff-banded Rail, can go for considerable distances once airborne even though they are not great flyers. This has enabled the flying species of this genus to colonize islands all over the region.
Many of the resultant flightless island endemics became extinct after the arrival of humans, which hunted these birds for food, introduced novel predators like rats, dogs or pigs, and upset the local ecosystems. A common Polynesian name of these rails, mainly relatives of G. philippensis, is weka/veka.
One species, the Guam Rail, is extinct in the wild; there exists a semi-wild population in preparation for reintroduction to its original habitat. Three more species have gone extinct in historic times, while two others - the New Caledonian and Sharpe's Rails - are probably extinct. Two further species are assumed from circumstantial evidence to have survived into the Modern era but are not known from recent specimens.
On the other hand, Gallirallus species are (with the exception of the Weka) notoriously retiring and shy birds with often drab coloration. Given that the Okinawa Rail and the Calayan Rail have only been discovered in the late 20th century and as late as 2004, respectively, it cannot be ruled out that the New Caledonian and Sharpe's Rail may still exist.
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[edit] Living and recently extinct species
- Weka, Gallirallus australis
- New Caledonian Rail, Gallirallus lafresnayanus - probably extinct (c.1990?)
- Lord Howe Woodhen, Gallirallus sylvestris
- Okinawa Rail, Gallirallus okinawae
- Calayan Rail, Gallirallus calayanensis
- Barred Rail, Gallirallus torquatus
- New Britain Rail, Gallirallus insignis
- Buff-banded Rail, Gallirallus philippensis
- Roviana Rail, Gallirallus rovianae
- Guam Rail, Gallirallus owstoni - extinct in the wild (late 1980s)
- Dieffenbach's Rail, Gallirallus dieffenbachii - extinct (mid-19th century)
- Tahiti Rail, Gallirallus pacificus - extinct (late 18th - 19th century)
- Wake Island Rail, Gallirallus wakensis - extinct (1945)
- Sharpe's Rail, Gallirallus sharpei - probably extinct (20th century?)
- Slaty-breasted Rail, Gallirallus striatus
[edit] Species extinct before 1500 AD
- Nuku Hiva Rail, Gallirallus epulare
- Ua Huka Rail, Gallirallus gracilitibia
- Niue Rail, Gallirallus huiatua
- Mangaia Rail, Gallirallus ripleyi
- Tahuata Rail, Gallirallus roletti
- Huahine Rail, Gallirallus storrsolsoni
- ‘Eua Rail, Gallirallus vekamatolu - possibly survived to the early 19th century[1]
- Marianas Rail, Gallirallus cf. owstoni
- New Ireland Rail, Gallirallus sp.
- Norfolk Island Rail, Gallirallus sp. - possibly survived to the early 19th century
- Hiva Oa Rail, ?Gallirallus sp.
[edit] Footnotes
[edit] References
- BirdLife International www.birdlife.org
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