Chloridops regiskongi
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| Chloridops regiskongi | ||||||||||||
| Olson & James , 1991 |
Chloridops regiskongi (English common name : King Kong Grosbeak) is an extinct species of bird from the subfamily of the Hawaiian honeycreeper . It occurred on Oahu and is only known from subfossil material.
features
Chloridops regiskongi had the longest beak of all known seed-eating honeysuckles . The beak differs from other species of the genus Chloridops by its deeper and more sharply pointed upper jaw . The sides of the upper jaw rise steeply and form a blunt ridge that runs along the dorsal midline from the tip through the bridge of the nose
distribution
The subfossil material comes from Barbers Point and ʻUlupau Head on Oʻahu.
etymology
The type epithet is made up of the syllables “ regis ” (Latin for “ the king ”) and “ kong ” for “ King Kong ”. It is based on the newspaper article " Harbor sites yield rare fossils " by reporter B. Benson in the Honolulu Star Bulletin of July 24, 1977, in which Storrs Olson with the words "a giant, gargantuan, a King Kong finch (German: a huge, enormous, a King Kong finch) ”was quoted. Olson stated that he never mentioned it in that form. However, due to the popularity of the film monkey King Kong, this name finally established itself as a trivial name.
die out
The causes and timing of the extinction are unknown. Presumably the species died out within the last 1500 years during the Polynesian colonization, but before the arrival of the Europeans in the 18th century.
literature
- Pratt, Harold Douglas: The Hawaiian Honeycreepers . Oxford University Press, 2002, ISBN 9780198546535 .
- Olson, Storrs L .; James, Helen F. (1991): Descriptions of Thirty-Two New Species of Birds from the Hawaiian Islands: Part II. Passeriformes . Ornithological Monographs 46: 1-91. PDF online .