Anthornis melanocephala (Chatham Island Bellbird)

[sebbe67]

Anthornis melanocephala

Chatham Island Bellbird Anthornis melanocephala was endemic to forest on Chatham, Mangere and Little Mangere Islands, New Zealand. The reasons for its decline are obscure, but were probably a combination of habitat destruction and predation by introduced rats and cats, despite the fact that Little Mangere—from where the last records came in 1906—had neither predators nor extensive forest. Taxonomy Although sometimes treated as a subspecies of New Zealand Bellbird A. melanura, the Chatham Island taxon differed in both structure and plumage.

[sebbe67]

last observed in 1906 on Little Mangare Island

arboreal island forest insectivore endemic to Chatham Islands, Pacific Ocean

disappeared after introduction of implied disease (sudden population decline before onset of other disturbance), rats, cats; probably finished off by collectors

[Deleted]

Hi !

Does anyone know a pic of this subspecies ?

[another specialist]

source for first entry

www.redlist.org/search/details.php?species=40153

www.birdlife.org/datazone/search/species_search.html?action=SpcHTMDetails.asp&sid=30106&m=0

[another specialist]

source for second entry

www.uwsp.edu/geo/faculty/heywood/geog358/extinctb/CIBellBi.htm

[Deleted]

Hi !

I had only a poor description:



Bye
Alex

[another specialist]

nice pic even with the poor description you had at hand at the time

[sebbe67]

Source: The Doomsday book

[Deleted]

@ sebbe67,

Thank You so much for that image, this is the first one that I see.

[Carlos]

Well. I've made a photoshop reconstruction of this species/subspecies using a picture of a male bellbird (Anthornis melanura) and using also a poor description of the extinct Chatham Island form (A. melanocephala) that I have in an old New Zealand Birds Field Guide (1966), that states that it was like the mainland form but "larger, head deep purple and reduced patch (tuft)on the sides".

This is the result that could match that poor description:

Any constructive criticism?

[Deleted]

... very nice !!! ;D

My very poor description says the iris was yellow, that of the 'mainland'-birds is brown.

[Deleted]

above: before
below: after



The dark purple on the head more extendet and darker, almost black, the iris yellow.

[Carlos]

I really enjoy this photoshoping thing. This is my second try. This time darker hood (almost black), small yelow tuft, and yellow iris:

before


after

[Deleted]

carlos said:

I really enjoy this photoshoping thing.

Yes, its funny ! I like it too !

The bill is said to be black, and the legs brown, but this could be a result of fading colour. Also the bird was larger than the 'mainland' race.

[Carlos]

Great!!

At least we have now a better approach to how this (sadly) extinct bird looked like.

[dysmorodrepanis]

Luther's "Die ausgestorbenen Vögel der Welt" shows its age, but in some respects (for subspecies or what once was thought to be ssp.) it's still unsurpassed; much genuine research concerning specimens etc.

It has the following description:
Length 25 cm (male). Larger and more dark-headed that the mainland forms. Olive green, belly and flanks lighter. Forehead and top of head steely blue, changing into purple-blue on the sides of the head and the throat. Remiges and rectrices blackish-brown with olive green margins. Iris yellow, bill black, legs brown.

[Carlos]

Thank you, Dysmorodrepanis for unearth that description in that old book. It is true that they used to work harder on specimens by then and such old descriptions are still reliable and, as you mention, unsurpassed in many a occasion.

I've made a new photoshop approach to this form, surely closer to the original than the ones posted before:

[dysmorodrepanis]

There is a comprehensive paper in Notornis 34 on this bird. Check it out here: www.notornis.org.nz/free_issues/Notornis_34-1987/Notornis_34_4.pdf

Every source was wrong on the wings and tail - the remiges and rectrices are black in adult birds; the type specimen is a juvenile!

[sebbe67]

collections.tepapa.govt.nz/welcome.aspx?ReturnUrl=%2fobjectsearch.aspx (found by adzebill)

[Melanie]

Anthornis Melanocephala. (Chatham-Island Bell-Bird.)

 Anthornis melanocephala, Gray, in Dieff. Trav. ii., App. p. 188 (1843).


 Anthornis auriocula, Buller, Essay on the Orn. of N. Z. p. 8 (1865).
? similis A. melanuroe , sed conspicuè major: pileo undique chalybeo, indigotico vel purpureo nitente.
? juv . similis adulto, sed pallidior: abdomine imo cum crisso et hypochondriis imis fulvescentibus: fronte
vix chalybeo nitente: filamentis pilei gulaeque chalybeo-nigris: fasciâ mystacali indistinctâ, pallidè flavâ:
tectricibus alarum, remigibus et rectricibus brunnescenti-nigris, paullò chalybeo lavatis, extùs angustè
flavicanti-olivaceo limbatis: rostro nigro: pedibus brunneis, plantis pallidioribus, unguibus saturatè
brunneis: iride aureâ.
Adult male. The whole of the plumage olive-green, lighter on the sides of the body and lower part of
abdomen; beneath dark plumbeous, this being observable only on raising the feathers; forehead and
crown steel-blue, changing to a purplish-blue gloss on the sides of the head, nape, throat, and fore part of
the breast, these parts appearing shot with purple and blue in certain lights; quills dusky brown, with
yellowish-brown shafts, margined on the outer webs with yellow; the small wing-coverts steel-blue,
margined with olivegreen; tail-feathers dusky black, with steel-black margins; the soft ventral feathers and
under tail-coverts fulvous yellow, the latter with an olivaceous tinge. Irides golden yellow (?); bill black;
tarsi, toes, and claws dark brown. Total length 10 inches; wing, from flexure, 4·25; tail 4·5; bill, along the
ridge ·7, along the edge of lower mandible ·9; tarsus 1·5; middle toe and claw 1·05; hind toe and claw
1·15.
Female. Although, since the publication of my former edition, I have received four or five examples of
this bird from the Chatham Islands, I have never yet had an opportunity of comparing the female. Prof.
Hutton says that “it is similar to the female of A. melanura except as to size.”
Young. An examination of the type of Anthornis melanocephala in the British Museum satisfied me that
the bird named by me ( I. c.) was only the young of this species. The following is a description of this
specimen, which is now in the Colonial Museum at Wellington:—The whole of the plumage yellowish
olive, paler on the underparts, and tinged with fulvous on the abdomen, flanks, and under tail-coverts;
faint steel gloss on the forehead; produced filaments on the crown, sides of the head, and throat
steel-black; from the angle of the mouth a narrow indistinct streak of pale yellow; wing-feathers and their
coverts, also tail-feathers, blackish brown, with a faint steel gloss, their outer webs narrowly margined
with yellowish olive; inner lining of wings pale yellow. Irides golden yellow; bill black; tarsi and toes
brown, with paler soles; claws umber-brown. Total length 9·5 inches; wing, from flexure, 4·4; tail 4·5;
tarsus 1·5. (On a close inspection of this specimen two minute feathers of steel-blue on the side of the
head give indication of a change of plumage.)
Obs. Gray's type was obtained by Dr. Dieffenbach, the naturalist to the New-Zealand Company, who
visited the Chatham Islands in 1839. I may mention that it is not in the fully-matured plumage. Three of
the tailfeathers on one side are dusky black, deepening to glossy steel-black on the outer webs; the rest
are, like the wing-feathers, dusky brown, margined with olivaceous green. In the adult male the primaries
and secondaries, as well as the tail, assume the dark colour.
Thisspecies, which is a native of the Chatham Islands, is very similar to the well-known Anthornis
melanura ; but, as will be seen on referring to the measurements given above, it is considerably larger. It
differs, moreover, in having the whole of the head and neck brightly glossed with purplish or steel-blue.
During a visit to the Chatham Islands in 1855, I observed this Anthornis in the woods near Waitangi,
and procured a specimen, although, as already mentioned, I was unable at the time to identify it. In giving those of A. melanura being bright cherry-red. I observed that its habits were precisely similar to those of
the common Bell-bird, but that its notes appeared to be louder and somewhat less musical. Its gregarious
instincts are the same; for, on imitating the alarm-cry, I was immediately surrounded by a number of these
birds in a high state of excitement.
Mr. Henry Travers, from whom I have received several specimens, states that he found it in great
numbers on Mangare, less frequent on the main island, and rare on Pitt Island. It had commenced to
breed in October, and its nest, which he describes as being “composed of grass and feathers, large and
coarsely constructed,” contained as a rule three eggs. He considers its song richer and fuller than that of
its New-Zealand congener. It seemed to me very much the same, but louder.
It is said that of late years this bird has deserted the neighbourhood of the native villages and settlers’
homesteads, and retired to the southern portion of Wharekauri (as the main island is called), where the
woods have not yet been destroyed
*Zoologist, 1885, vol. xliii. p. 422.
.
It is a remarkable fact that whereas the New-Zealand bird is common enough at the Chatham Islands,
this larger form has never been found in any part of New Zealand. The two species subsist on the same
kind of food; and it is difficult to account for this peculiarity of range on any principle of geographical
distribution. Where species are representative of each other in neighbouring islands, as is the case with
several birds inhabiting the North and South Islands respectively, this differentiation of character, with the
necessary lapse of time, is intelligible enough; but the present case is entirely different. If the
long-continued separation had affected the New-Zealand bird to any appreciable degree, the same result
must presumably have happened to the same bird in the Chatham Islands, four hundred miles distant; we
find, however, the same type common to both places, which in itself would occasion no surprise but for
the singular fact that the larger and stronger form, associated with it, is confined strictly to the smaller
area, and preserves its distinctive character.
It seems to me probable that in former times both species inhabited New Zealand, and that, as
Anthornis melanura is now rapidly disappearing from the mainland, so in like manner the other species
may have died out before we became acquainted with the country. In that case, however, it would be
necessary to discover some other factor than the Norwegian rat, which, as explained on a former page, is
suspected of the principal mischief now. The survival of the extirpated race in the Chatham Islands is
consistent with this supposition, because it is an observed law of nature that expiring races of animals and
plants linger to the last in such insular areas.
The nest of this species is very much larger than that of the Anthornis melanura . A specimen in the
Canterbury Museum measures in its largest diameter about 8 inches by 7 inches. It is composed chiefly
of dry narrow flags or grasses bent in a circular form, the outer wall being strengthened with an admixture
of fibrous twigs. The cavity, which is rather loosely formed, as compared with that of the latter, is roughly
lined with sheep's wool, with a few small feathers intermixed. It contained two eggs, which differ
somewhat from each other, both in form and colour. One of them is of a warm salmon-pink, thickly
blotched at the larger end, and spotted at irregular intervals on the general surface with reddish brown,
ovoido-elliptical in form, and measuring 1·05 inch by ·75 inch. The other egg is more oval in form, paler
in colour, and less marked with reddish brown, the spots being much smaller and more scattered over the
surface.

Source: Buller: A History of the Birds of New Zealand.