Giant Hoopoe
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Order: Coraciiformes
Family: Upupidae
Synonyms: Upupa antaois (lapsus)
[Photo] Reconstruction of the (presumed to be) flightless Giant Hoopoe (Upupa antaios) of Saint Helena. presumed to have gone extinct soon after the island's discovery and colonization. URL: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Upupa_antaios.JPG | Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License". |
The Giant Hoopoe (Upupa antaios), also known as St. Helena Giant Hoopoe or St. Helena Hoopoe, is an extinct species of Hoopoe (family Upupidae), known exclusively from an incomplete subfossil skeleton.
It was endemic to the island of Saint Helena in the South Atlantic. It is considered that it was much larger than its European and African relatives. In addition it was completely flightless. The incomplete skeleton which was found in 1975 by palaeontologist Storrs Olson consists of both coracoids and the left femur. The reasons for its extinction remained unknown, though, it is assumed that it became extinct soon after, if not immediately after, St. Helena was discovered and colonized in 1502, due to the introduction of predators such as black rats, and domestic cats, as well as habitat destruction.
As all known hoopoes are insectivores that feed primarily on large insects, the Giant Hoopoe may have been a predator of the St. Helena earwig, an insect which has not been seen alive since 1967.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_Hoopoe
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