Tag Archives: Acanthisittidae

Dendroscansor decurvirostris Millener & Worthy

Long-billed New Zealand Wren (Dendroscansor decurvirostris)

The family Acanthisittidae, endemic to New Zealand, contains of six (or seven) species, the last remnants of a once more diverse group of birds whose final refuge is the isolated islands of New Zealand.

Four (or five) of these species are now extinct.

***
The Long-billed New Zealand Wren is only known from a few subfossil bones found at four sites on New Zealand’s South Island.

The bird was a rather large member of its family and probably flightless, or at least nearly so. It used its beak to search for small invertebrates in the leaf litter or to examine the bark of rotten branches for wood-boring larvae.

An unsuspecting ground-dweller that has never before encountered predatory mammals, the New Zealand Long-billed new Zealand Wren was probably one of the first victims of the raids of the Polynesian Rat (Rattus exulans (Peale)), which was introduced to New Zealand by the Maori in the 13th century .

********************

Depiction: Alexander Lang

*********************

References:

[1] Trevor H. Worthy, Richard N. Holdaway: The Lost World of the Moa, Prehistoric Life of New Zealand. Indiana University Press, Bloomington 2002

********************

edited: 11.02.2024

Xenicus longipes ssp. variabilis Stead

Stokes’ Bushwren (Xenicus longipes ssp. variabilis)

Stokes’ Bushwren was endemic to Stewart Island and some of the small islets surrounding it, including Kotiwhenua- and Taukihepa Islands.

The form disappeared from Stewart Island already at the beginning of the 20th century but was still reasonably common on some of the offshore islets and survived on the predator-free Taukihepa Island until the invasion by Black Rats (Rattus rattus (L.)) in 1964. The New Zealand Wildlife Service attempted to save the species by relocating all the birds they could capture. They caught six birds and transferred them to Kaimohu Island, where, unfortunately, they did not survive and finally died out in 1972.

***

There are some photos taken in 1913 by Herbert Guthrie-Smith on Taukihepa (Big South Cape) Island, one is shown below.

*********************

Photo from: “Herbert Guthrie-Smith: Bird Life on Island and Shore. 1925”

(public domain)

*********************

edited: 21.01.2022

Xenicus longipes ssp. longipes (Gmelin)

Bushwren (Xenicus longipes ssp. longipes)

The Bushwren, called huru-pounamu, matuhi, matuhituhi, or piwauwau by the Maori, was a 9 to 10 cm small, nearly flightless bird that was originally found very abundantly in the dense forests of New Zealand’s three main islands, each inhabited by an endemic subspecies respectively.

***

The nominate race was endemic to South Island, it was still very common in the middle of the 19th century, when Walter L. Buller in his “A history of the birds of New Zealand” wrote the following note.:

“It is generally met with singly or in pairs, but sometimes several are associated, attracting notice by the sprightliness of their movements. They run along the boles and branches of the trees with restless activity, peering into every crevice and searching the bark for the small insects and larvae on which they feed. It is strictly arboreal in its habits, never being seen on the ground, in which respect it differs conspicuously from the closely allied species Xenicus gilviventris. It has a week but lively note, and its powers of flight are very limited.” [1]

***

The Bushwren begun to disappear very quickly after Stoats (Mustela erminea L.) were introduced to New Zealand in the 1880s with the last official sigthing of birds of the nominate race having taken place in 1968 in the Nelson Lakes National Park in the northern part of South Island.

*********************

References:

[1] Walter L. Buller: A history of the birds of New Zealand. London: John Van Voorst 1873

*********************

(the two birds above)

Depiction from: ‘Walter L. Buller: A history of the birds of New Zealand. London: John Van Voorst 1873’

(public domain)

*********************

edited: 17.04.2019