Mullerornis modestus (Milne-Edwards & Grandidier, 1869)
Elephant bird
Taxonomy & Nomenclature
Synonym/s: Aepyornis modestus Milne-Edwards & Grandidier, 1869:314; Mullerornis agilis Milne-Edwards & Grandidier, 1894:125; Mullerornis betsilei Milne-Edwards & Grandidier, 1894:125; Mullerornis rudis Milne-Edwards & Grandidier, 1894:125
Conservation Status
Extinct
Last record: Holocene
Distribution & Habitat
Madagascar
Biology & Ecology
Collagen values (Joseph & Seymour, 2022).
Hypodigm
Media
References
Original scientific description:
Milne-Edwards, A. and Grandidier, A. (1869). Nouvelles observations sur les caractères zoologiques et les affinités naturelles de l'Aepyornis de Madagascar. J. Acad. Natural Sci. 69: 83-87.
Other references:
Faurby, Søren, Matthews, Tom J., Triantis, Kostas A. and Sayol, Ferran. (2026). Quantifying the unrecorded loss of avian phylogenetic diversity. Ecography 2026: e08267. https://doi.org/10.1002/ecog.08267
Goodman, S. M. (1999). Holocene bird subfossils from the sites of Ampasambazimba, Antsirabe and Ampoza, Madagascar:Changes in the avifauna of south central Madagascar over the past few millennia. In: Adams, N.J. & Slotow, R.H. (eds) Proc. 22 Int. Ornithol. Congr., Durban: 3071-3083. Johannesburg: BirdLife South Africa.
Grealy, Alicia et al. (2023). Molecular exploration of fossil eggshell uncovers hidden lineage of giant extinct bird. Nature Communications 14: 914. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-36405-3
Hansford, James P. and Turvey, Samuel T. (2018). Unexpected diversity within the extinct elephant birds (Aves: Aepyornithidae) and a new identity for the world's largest bird. R. Soc. open sci. 5: 181295.
Hansford, James P. et al. (2018). Early Holocene human presence in Madagascar evidenced by exploitation of avian megafauna. Science Advances 4(9): eaat6925.
Joseph, Grant S. and Seymour, Colleen L. (2022). Are Madagascar's obligate grazing-lawns ancient and evolved with endemic herbivores, or recently selected by introduced cattle? Biology Letters 18: 20220212.
https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2022.0212
Matthews, Thomas J., Triantis, Kostas A., Wayman, Joseph P., Martin, Thomas E., Hume, Julian P., Cardoso, Pedro, Faurby, Søren, Mendenhall, Chase D., Dufour, Paul, Rigal, François, Cooke, Rob, Whittaker, Robert J., Pigot, Alex L., Thébaud, Christophe, Jørgensen, Maria Wagner, Benavides, Eva, Soares, Filipa C., Ulrich, Werner, Kubota, Yasuhiro, Sadler, Jon P., Tobias, Joseph A. and Sayol, Ferran. (2024). The global loss of avian functional and phylogenetic diversity from anthropogenic extinctions. Science 386(6717): 55-60. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adk7898 [Supplementary Materials; Dryad dataset; Zenodo codeset]
Matthews, Thomas J., Wayman, Joseph P., Cardoso, Pedro, Sayol, Ferran, Hume, Julian P., Ulrich, Werner, Tobias, Joseph A., Soares, Filipa C., Thébaud, Christophe, Martin, Thomas E. and Triantis, Kostas A. (2022). Threatened and extinct island endemic birds of the world: Distribution, threats and functional diversity. Journal of Biogeography 49(11): 1920-1940. https://doi.org/10.1111/jbi.14474 [Appendix S1 (.docx); Appendix S2 (.pdf)]
Rothschild, Lionel Walter. (1907). Extinct birds: an attempt to write in one volume a short account of those birds which have become extinct in historical times, that is within the last six or seven hundred years: to which are added a few which still exist, but are on the verge of extinction. London: Hutchinson & Co. XXIX + 243 pp. [p. 229]
Sayol, Ferran, Steinbauer, Manuel J., Blackburn, Tim M., Antonelli, Alexandre and Faurby, Søren. (2020). Anthropogenic extinctions conceal widespread evolution of flightlessness in birds. Science Advances 6(49): eabb6095. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abb6095 [Supplementary Material (Data File S1)]
Torres, Christopher R. and Clarke, Julia A. (2018). Nocturnal giants: evolution of the sensory ecology in elephant birds and other palaeognaths inferred from digital brain reconstructions. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, Biological Sciences. DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2018.1540 [Abstract]