Birdfinding.info ⇒ The Kioea is known mainly from four specimens collected between 1840 and 1859 from interior highlands of the Big Island. The precise locations are not well-documented, but are believed to include the Ola’a Tract and dry forests between Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa.
Kioea †
Chaetoptila angustipluma
Extinct. Formerly endemic to the Big Island of Hawaii.
Identification
A large, robust honeyeater with a thick decurved bill and a prominent blackish mask. It was olive-brown overall, with dense, bold whitish streaks predominating over the head, neck, underparts, and upper back. Suffused with a yellowish wash on the throat, nape, sides, belly, and tail.
In pattern and coloration it was remarkably similar to the Palmchat (Dulus dominicus) of Hispaniola, a peculiar single-species family that is believed to be among the few fairly close relatives of the Hawaiian honeyeaters. The two species are not known to be similar in any other significant respect, and their proximity in the phylogenetic tree was unknown prior to the 2000s.
Kioea. Frederick Frohawk, 1890
Kioea. (Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum.) © Andrew Esposito
Kioea. (Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum.) © camerai2i
Kioea. John Gerrard Keulemans, 1900
Kioea. (Cat. 458995, American Museum of Natural History, New York.) © Andrew Esposito
Kioea. (Cat. 458995, American Museum of Natural History, New York.) © Andrew Esposito
Notes
Monotypic species.
IUCN Red List Status: Extinct.
References
BirdLife International. 2016. Chaetoptila angustipluma. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2016: e.T22704348A93964400. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2016-3.RLTS.T22704348A93964400.en. (Accessed June 14, 2020.)
Hume, J.P. 2017. Extinct Birds (Second Edition). Bloomsbury Publishing PLC, London.
Pratt, H.D., P.L. Bruner, and D.G. Berrett. 1987. A Field Guide to the Birds of Hawaii and the Tropical Pacific. Princeton University Press.
Pyle, R.L., and P. Pyle. 2017. The Birds of the Hawaiian Islands: Occurrence, History, Distribution, and Status. Version 2 (January 1, 2017). http://hbs.bishopmuseum.org/birds/rlp-monograph/. B.P. Bishop Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii.