Apteribis brevis Olson & James, 1991:23

Maui upland apteribis, Maui flightless ibis, Maui highland apteribis

Taxonomy & Nomenclature

Conservation Status

Extinct

Last record: 1850 ± 270yBP (Harmon et al., 2026)

Distribution & Habitat

Maui, Hawaiian Islands, USA

Biology & Ecology

Hypodigm

Media

References

Original scientific description:

Olson, Storrs L. and James, Helen F. (1991). Descriptions of thirty-two new species of birds from the Hawaiian Islands: Part I. Non-Passeriformes. Ornithological Monographs, No. 45: 1-88.

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

Harmon, Kristen C., Price, Melissa R. and Winter, Kawika B. (2026). The “regime shift extinctions” hypothesis and mass
extinction of waterbirds in Hawaiʻi. Ecosphere 17: e70445. https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.70445

Hume, Julian Pender and Walters, Michael. (2012). Extinct Birds. London: T & AD Poyser. 544 pp.

Iwaniuk, Andrew N. et al. (2004). A comparative test of the correlated evolution of flightlessness and relative brain size in birds. J. Zool, Land. 263: 317-327.

James, H. F., T. Stafford, D. Steadman, S. Olson, P. Martin, A. Jull, and P. McCoy. 1987. “Radiocarbon Dates on Bones of Extinct Birds from Hawaii.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 84: 2350-2354.

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)]

Olson, S. L., and H. F. James. 1982b. “Prodromus of the Fossil Avifauna of the Hawaiian Islands.” Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology 365: 1-59.

Olson, S. L., and H. F. James. 1984. “The Role of Polynesians in the Extinction of the Avifauna of the Hawaiian Islands.” In Quaternary Extinctions: A Prehistoric Revolution, edited by P. S. Martin and R. G. Klein, 768–780. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.

Olson, S. L., and A. Wetmore. 1976. “Preliminary Diagnoses of Two Extraordinary New Genera of Birds from Pleistocene Deposits in the Hawaiian Islands.” Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington 89(18): 247-258.

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)]

Tyrberg, Tommy. (2009). Holocene avian extinctions, pp. 63-106. In: Turvey, Samuel T. (ed.). Holocene Extinctions. Oxford, UK & New York, USA: Oxford University Press. xii + 352 pp.

https://extinctanimals.proboards.com/thread/6386/apteribis-brevis-maui-upland

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