Reunion owl
Reunion owl | ||||||||||||
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Systematics | ||||||||||||
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Scientific name | ||||||||||||
Otus grucheti | ||||||||||||
( Mourer-Chauviré , Bour , Moutou & Ribes , 1994) |
The Réunion owl ( Otus grucheti , synonym: Mascarenotus grucheti ) is an extinct species of the scops owl ( Otus ) that was endemic to the Mascarenes island of Réunion . Until 2018 it was in the independent genus Mascarenotus and is only known from subfossil material from the Holocene . The art epithet honors Harry Gruchet, a curator from the Muséum d'Histoire naturelle de La Réunion in Saint-Denis .
features
The Réunion owl reached roughly the size of the Mauritius owl ( Mascarenotus sauzieri ). However, their wing elements were slightly reduced and their legs were longer.
habitat
The Reunion owl was likely a secret inhabitant of dense and remote forests.
History of Discovery and Extinction
In 1974 Bertrand Kervazo unearthed the holotype , a right tarsometatarsus , in the Grotto des Premiers Français near Saint-Paul . In 1980, a humerus and a tibiotarsus were discovered in the Grotte de l'Autel near Saint-Gilles . Between 1990 and 1992, three tarsometatarsi, a femur and an incomplete os quadratum were found in the Marais de l'Ermitage fossil site. It is very likely that the Reunion owl became extinct during the 18th century as a result of massive deforestation .
literature
- Michael P. Walters & Julian Pender Hume: Extinct Birds , Poyser Monographes A & C Black, 2012. ISBN 978-140-815-725-1 , pp. 194-195
- Anthony S. Cheke, Julian Hume: Lost Land of the Dodo. An Ecological History of Mauritius, Réunion & Rodrigues. T & AD Poyser, London 2008, ISBN 978-0-7136-6544-4 .
- Cécile Mourier-Chauviré, Roger Bour, François Moutou & Sonia Ribes (1994): Mascarenotus nov. gen. (Aves, Strigiformes), genre endémique éteint des Mascareignes et M. grucheti n. sp., espèce éteinte de La Réunion . CR Acad. Sci. Paris sér. II 318: 1699-1706.
Web link
- Mascarenotus grucheti inthe IUCN 2013 Red List of Threatened Species . Listed by: BirdLife International, 2012. Retrieved October 16, 2013.