New Refuge to Protect Neotropical Birds in the Dominican Republic

Leonel Fernández, President of the Dominican Republic, has announced the creation of a new refuge “Reserva Biologica Loma Charco Azul” on the northwestern border of Sierra de Bahoruco National Park, a global biodiversity hotspot.

“With 30 endemic bird species, Hispaniola ranks high in global importance for bird conservation,” said Dr. George Wallace, American Bird Conservancy’s Vice President of Oceans and Islands. “With forests in Haiti virtually gone and an accelerated rate of forest loss in the Dominican Republic, many of these species face a bleak future—of the 30 species, 14 are ranked by IUCN as globally threatened. That’s why expanding land protected in the vicinity of Sierra de Bahoruco is so important and such a significant accomplishment.”

Hispaniolian Parrot ©Pedro Genaro Rodríguez

In addition, over 30 species of Neotropical migratory birds have been recorded there; they form an important component of the biodiversity during the northern winter, making up more than 50% of the bird life in some habitats, particularly pine forests.

The Bahoruco National Park is the most important remaining forested site for endemic birds in the Dominican Republic. The park is seriously threatened by slash and burn agriculture, hunting, the collection of birds for the pet trade, and potentially mining and unplanned tourism development.

Bay-breasted Cuckoo ©Lance Woolaver

This site, is the global stronghold for three endangered species—Bay-breasted Cuckoo, La Selle Thrush, and Hispaniolan Crossbill—and five more that are globally vulnerable—Hispaniolan Parrot, Hispaniolan Parakeet, Golden Swallow, Chat Tanager, and White-winged Warbler. Other endangered species such a Bicknell’s Thrush and the Black-capped Petrel are also present.

More information from American Bird Conservancy here.

Special thanks to Pedro Genaro Rodríguez for the Hispaniolan Parrot photo, con can see more photos in his website www.pedrogenaro.com

 

Second Chances: Rediscovering Lost and Extinct Birds. Part II

Rediscovered Bird Species in Peru and the Neotropical Region

This is the second part in a three part blog series examining the phenomenon of rediscovering bird species that were once thought lost or extinct.

Rediscovered Bird Species in Peru:

White-winged Guan (Penelope albipennis)

The White-winged Guan is a classic example of rediscovered Neotropical avifauna. The species was described based on a specimen collected in the Tumbes mangroves, near the border between Peru and Ecuador by the Polish zoologist Władysław Taczanowski in 1876. It wasn’t seen again for nearly 100 years and it was thought extinct until the conservationist Gustavo del Solar rediscovered it in the dry forests of northern Peru with the help of local people. An initial assessment found that there were very few in the wild, so it was decided to start a captive breeding program. Subsequently White-winged Guan born into captivity have begun to be released into their native habitat, establishing new populations in surrounding forests.

White-winged Guan ©David Cook

White-masked Antbird (Pithys castaneus)

In 1938, Berlioz described a distinctive new species of antbird in the genus Pithys, from a single specimen collected by Ramon Olalla on September 16, 1937, at ‘‘Andoas, lower Pastaza, eastern Ecuador’’. This new species, the White-masked Antbird (Pithys castaneus), has remained one of the most intriguing mysteries of Neotropical ornithology for over 60 years. It was thought extinct until its rediscovery by Thomas Valqui on July 3, 2001, in the northwestern Morona River, Loreto, Peru.

Imperial Snipe (Gallinago imperialis)

In 1869, Sclater and Salvin described a large, richly colored snipe from a single specimen obtained from the Andes in the vicinity of Bogota, Colombia, and named it Gallinago imperialis. There were no records of this species until its rediscovery by John Terborgh in the summer of 1967 in the Cordillera de Vilcabamba, Peru. Later, in 1990 it was found again by Niels Krabbe, high on the volcano Pichincha in Ecuador.

Equatorial Graytail (Xenerpestes singularis)

This bird was described in 1885 from a single specimen collected by Stolzmann at Mapoto, Provincia Ampato, in the eastern Andes of Ecuador. It was re-discovered in September 1977 in the cloud forests of the department of San Martin in northern Peru by Ted Parker. Later the Equatorial Graytail was also found in other localities in the department of Cajamarca in Peru.

Yellow-browed Toucanet (Aulacorhynchus huallagae)

The Yellow-browed Toucanet was described from a single male specimen collected "on the trail to Utcubamba, in the Huallaga Valley, east of Tayabamba" Peru, on May 3, 1932, by Carriker. The specimen was collected from "a small band" of birds, the only individuals he saw in the area. The species was not seen again for 47 years, until 1979, when members of a Louisiana State University Museum of Natural Science (LSUMZ) expedition found them while following Carriker’s trail.

Rediscovered Bird Species in the Neotropical Region:

Golden-crowned Manakin (Lepidotrix vilasboasi)

The Golden-crowned Manakin was first discovered by German scientist Helmut Sick in 1957, and was officially recognized as a species in 1959. On May 14, 2002, it was rediscovered after many years in Brazil. Fábio Olmos who, together with José Fernando Pacheco, rediscovered the species said: "We were thrilled to find the lost manakin – quite distinctive from other manakins." He added: "The local economy is based on logging and cattle-ranching on cleared land. The Brazilian government is encouraging colonization but has no way of controlling loggers, squatters, colonists and gold miners once access is created. Forest destruction will remain a major threat to the long-term survival of this beautiful bird and other wildlife of the area."

Golden-crowned Manakin ©Fabio Olmos

Pale-headed Brush-Finch (Atlapetes pallidiceps)

The Pale-headed Brush-finch is a bird endemic to the Rio Jubones Valley in Azuay Province, Ecuador. It went unrecorded for 30 years despite several searches at the localities where the species had been collected in the 1960s. In November 1998, a small population of 10-20 birds was rediscovered in a side valley of the Rio Jubones drainage. Today this small population is protected in a private reserve created for this species.

Fuertes’s Parrot (Hapalopsittaca fuertesi)

On July 28, 2003, researchers of ProAves Colombia, supported by American Bird Conservancy (ABC) and the World Parrot Trust (WPT), rediscovered one of the world’s rarest parrots in the high Andes of Colombia confirming the survival of this long lost species. Colombian ornithologists Jorge Velasquez and Alonso Quevedo found a flock of 14 Fuertes’s Parrots in a remote area of the central Andes close to Los Nevados National Park. The species was originally described in 1911 by two bird collectors from the American Museum of Natural History in New York – Leo Miller and Arthur Allen.

Fuertes’s Parrot in Colombia ©ProAves Colombia

Kaempfer’s (Caatinga) Woodpecker (Celeus obrieni)

This species was first collected by E. Kaempfer on August 16, 1926, and deposited at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. In 1973, the specimen was recognized as a subspecies of Rufous-headed Woodpecker, until a commission of the SACC’s classified it as a distinct species in 2003. On October 21, 2006, it was rediscovered by Advaldo Dias do Prado and co-workers when they mist-netted and photographed a male of this species at Goiatins, in the state of Tocantins.

Kaempfer’s Woodpecker ©Guilherme R C Silva

A special thanks to ProAves Colombia for the Fuertes’s Parrot photo. You can see more about their work to conserve Colombian avifauna here.

 

Second Chances: Rediscovering Lost and Extinct Birds I

When I started writing this post I spent a couple of days reading articles and taking notes about the subject. At the end of the day I had too much information to be included in a single posting. I have therefore decided to launch a series that will be divided into three parts. In Part I I will talk about the reasons why a species once thought extinct, returns. Part II will be an historical account of some species of birds from Peru, the Neotropical region and the world that at some point were "lost" or considered extinct. Finally, in Part III I will discuss bird species in the Neotropical region that are considered lost species waiting to be rediscovered.

Part I: Why we Rediscover Lost and Extinct Birds?

In recent months we have witnessed the rediscovery of two species of birds thought to be extinct – the Fiji Petrel and the Banggai Crow. How it is possible that a species believed to be extinct is rediscovered?

One explanation for the rediscovery of bird species relates to the way that many species are initially described, using the skins of birds collected by naturalists during the nineteenth and early twentieth century. Many of these skins were not immediately reviewed when collected and have remained in storage, unstudied for decades. Only when a researcher takes these specimens out years later are new species recognized. This happened with Kaempfer’s (Caatinga) Woodpecker, collected in 1926, recognized as a sub species in 1973 and then elevated to species in 2003. In the more than seventy years that elapsed between collection and description of the species, it was believed that the species had become extinct until the first wild population of this newly recognized species was rediscovered in 2006.                                                                

Another reason behind the rediscovery of species is that museums sometimes have skins that are not properly labeled or the true geographic origins of the species are vague or unknown. A good example of this is the case of the Coppery Thorntail, known from two skins collected in 1852 somewhere in Bolivia. This lack of geographic detail as well as the fact that Bolivian boundaries have changed greatly since the time of collection has resulted in the fact that no person has yet seen this species in its habitat. However, the door is open for the possibility of rediscovery.

Confusion about the existence of certain species also arises when there are few specimens available for study. Scientists are challenged to classify whether these rare museum specimens truly represent a distinct species or if they are hybrids of other species. This happened with the White-masked Antibird. Scientists had been doubtful about the existence of the White-masked Antibird until it was recently rediscovered in Peru.

A slightly different scenario than rediscovering a species after it has been labeled extinct is recognizing that an ‘extinct’ species cannot be found because it never existed. Some ‘new’ species have been misidentified and are actually part of an extant species. This is the case with the Red-throated Wood-rail of Peru that went from being considered an extinct species to being dubious taxa by the SACC. The supposed Red-throated Wood-rail is now believed to be a poorly preserved specimen of the Gray-necked Wood-rail. Something similar happened with the Kalinowski’s Tinamou, of which all trace was lost for nearly 100 years until it was "rediscovered" in 2000. However, upon rediscovery, the SACC deemed that this species designation wasn’t valid; the Kalinowski’s Tinamou is now regarded as a synonym of Ornate Tinamou, another species that lives in Peru. A similar occurrence happened in the case of the Tasman Booby, which was believed extinct and now known to be a subspecies of Masked Booby.

In other instances, species that were collected, studied and described as new species in the nineteenth century remain in oblivion because their area of distribution encompasses very remote or inaccessible places where there are no people with the knowledge to identify them in the field. This happened with the Fiji Petrel rediscovered this year and the Chinese Crested Tern rediscovered in 2000 in an inaccessible military zone between China and Taiwan. These species were never really missing or extinct; it is just that people with the knowledge to identify these birds had not traveled to these remote or inaccessible areas.

Chinese Crested Tern © PeiWen Chang

Additionally, some birds are naturally shy and only came out at dawn or night. This was the case with the Imperial Snipe, described in 1869 from a single specimen obtained from the Andes in the vicinity of Bogota, Colombia. It was not seen again until 1967 when it was found in Peru by John Terborgh. There is also the possibility that two bird species can look very much alike, thus making them hard to distinguish in the field. For example, when Beck’s Petrel was rediscovered, the Birds Australia Rarities Committee, having pictures in hand, rejected the bird’s identity because they couldn’t separate this from the Tahiti’s Petrel.

Finally, sometimes a species has become so rare due to hunting, habitat loss or natural reasons, that it becomes almost impossible to find. This may be the case with the controversial Ivory-billed Woodpecker. It was rediscovered in 2004 in the Big Woods area of Arkansas. Although there have been intensive searches throughout the region, until now there is no undisputed record about the species’ survival and the status of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker remains undetermined.

Regardless of the amazement and joy at rediscovering a species that was once thought lost, these birds still need extensive protection. Usually these species are critically endangered and need a lot of attention from governments and bird advocates to survive in the long term. Through these rediscoveries nature has given us a second chance and we must do all that is possible to conserve these and other endangered birds as well as their habitats.

 

There isn’t a second chance for the Carolina Parakeet, it became extinct in 1918

In Part II of this series I’ll examine a case by case account of the latest species that have been rediscovered in Peru, the Neotropical region and the world.

All photos under Creative Commons License: Carolina Parakeet photo, Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences photo © Bill Lynch 

 

 

The Bogota Sunangel confirmed as valid species

Last night I was finishing the first part of a series of posts about Lost and Extinct bird species when I saw this news on Neotropical Birds site:

“The Bogota Sunangel lived! – confirmed as valid species”

This small hummingbird is know only because a single specimen that was purchased on 1909 in Bogota. It was probably collected in the East Andes or Central Andes of Colombia, within a few hundred kilometers of the capital. Its true provenance is impossible to determine, however, as some ‘Bogotá’ trade-skins came from much further afield, at least as far away as Venezuela and Ecuador.

Until very recently they were discussions about his status as a species (see SACC prop. 57)

According to J. Kirchman et al.:

We use mtDNA sequence data to confirm that the controversial 100-year-old holotype of the Bogotá sunangel (Heliangelus zusii) represents a valid species. We demonstrate that H. zusii is genetically well differentiated from taxa previously hypothesized to have given rise to the specimen via hybridization. Phylogenetic analyses place H. zusii as sister to a clade of mid- to high-elevation Andean species currently placed in the genera Taphrolesbia and Aglaiocercus. Heliangelus zusii, presumed extinct, has never been observed in nature by biologists.

Although confirmed as a valid species, there seems to be little hope that the Bogota Sunangel survives.  But there always is the possibility that it persists in some poorly explored portion of the Andes. Now, at least, field ornithologists have renewed reason to search for this mysterious bird. If we assume an ecological similarity to other sunangels, it should be looked for in humid Andean forest and well-developed shrublands between 1,500 and 3,400 m, especially in remote portions of the Colombian cordilleras.

More birds are waiting to be studied © Bill Lynch

Immediately started to think about all the other species that are preserved in museums waiting for someone to carefully study them and confirm their validity as species.

If you want to know more about other “Lost” birds don´t miss my new blog series starting this afternoon.

References:

Kirchman, J., Christopher C. Witt, Jimmy A. McGuire, and Gary R. Graves (2009)
DNA from a 100-year-old holotype confirms the validity of a potentially extinct hummingbird species Biol Lett: rsbl.2009.0545v1-rsbl20090545

Graves, G. (1993) Relict of a Lost World: A new Species of Sunangel (TROCHILIDAE: Heliangelus) from Bogota. The Auk 110(1): 1-8.

All photos under Creative Commons License

 

Technorati Tags: Bogota Sunangel,Colombia,lost birds,DNA

 

CLIMATE CHANGE AND NEOTROPICAL BIRDS

The Earth’s climate is changing, from the North Pole to the peaks of the Andes, average temperatures are rising steadily, glaciers are melting, coasts are been eroded at a rate never seen before. How will these changes affect bird species?

Glaciers are retreating worldwide © Jeff Huffman

Changes in Distribution and Range

We know that some plant species are experiencing changes in their latitudinal and altitudinal distribution in response to increased average temperatures worldwide. But these changes in the climate affect not only the distribution maps of many species of plants, but they also produce changes in their phenology, i.e., in periods of flowering and fruiting. There is evidence that these changes in distribution and phenology of plants directly affect nesting periods, distribution, migration times and feeding of many species of birds (2).

Some studies indicate that 400 of the 8,750 bird species studied may lose more than half of their range by 2050 due to climate change. This figure could grow to between 900 and 1800 species by 2100 and these changes would primarily affect birds that have restricted ranges in the tropics (3).

A study from the United States using data from the past 40 years showed that 60% of the 305 species of birds that winter in that country have changed their ranges, moving on average 35 miles to the north.

The Neotropical Region

There are fewer studies on how climate change will specifically impact birds in the Neotropical region. However there are some model-based studies that allow us to get an idea about the future of the birds of our region.

For example, research based on climate change models related to the savannas of the Cerrado in Brazil predict significant changes in the distribution of bird species up to 390 km to the southeast of the country. These changes in distribution could result in the extinction of some species of birds due to the fact that the new area of habitation for the birds is urbanized or is used for intensive agriculture, thus leaving the birds with less habitat (4).

White-bellied Cinclodes, an endangered bird that inhabit the highlands of the PeruvianAndes © Richard Gibbons

Another study using models on the distribution of 49 species of Manakins predicts that at least 20% of these species could become extinct if climate change continues and at least half of them could lose about 80% of their current distribution (1).

On the Peruvian coast, changes in ocean currents associated with the El Niño phenomenon, have a devastating effect on populations of seabirds. During the El Niño of 1997, approximately 70% of the population of Humboldt Penguins was lost. But more troubling is the situation of the Galapagos Penguin where populations of these endangered penguins have dropped by half since early 1970. During El Niño, adult penguins failed to reproduce in response to changes in the amount of fish that are part of their diet. It is expected that due to the effects of climate change, El Niño events will be more frequent in the future, further reducing these small populations of restricted Galapagos penguins and threatening them with extinction.

Galapagos Penguin © Kerry Lannert

Another species vulnerable to climate change is the critically endangered Pale-headed Brush-finch, rediscovered in 1998. Its habitat consists of a small shrub zone south of the Ecuadorian Andes. However, the small area where they live is going through changes in vegetation and therefore has initiated a management program preventing forest growths. Without human intervention, probably would not be available habitat for this bird.

You can make a difference. Here you will find some tips to combat the impact of climate change on birds.

Need more information? For more information, please check out Partners in Flight, a site which has an extensive bibliography on birds and climate change.

References:

1. Anciães M. and A. Townsend Peterson (2006) Climate change effects on neotropical manakin diversity based on ecological niche modeling. The Condor 108(4): 778-791.
2. Humphrey Q. P. Crick (2004) The impact of climate change on birds. Ibis Vol. 146 s1: 48-56
3. Jetz W, Wilcove DS, Dobson AP, (2007) Projected Impacts of Climate and Land-Use Change on the Global Diversity of Birds. PLoS Biol 5(6): e157. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.0050157
4. Marini MA, Barbet-Massin M, Lopes LE, Jiguet F. (2009) Predicted Climate-Driven Bird Distribution Changes and Forecasted Conservation Conflicts in a Neotropical Savanna. Conservation Biology

All photos under Creative Commons License