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Saint Helena Crake
The Saint Helena crake (''Zapornia astrictocarpus'') is an extinct bird species from the island of Saint Helena in the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic Ocean, one of two flightless birds, flightless Rallidae, rails which survived there until the early 16th century.Storrs L. Olson, Paleornithology of St Helena Island, south Atlantic Ocean, Smithsonian Contributions to Paleobiology 23 (1975) After American ornithology, ornithologist Alexander Wetmore described bones of the large Saint Helena rail (''Aphanocrex podarces'') from Prosperous Bay Plain, Prosperous Bay, Saint Helena, in 1963, American paleontologist Storrs Olson found almost complete skeletons of the Saint Helena crake in the same region in 1973. These skeletons consist of bones which were smaller than the bones of ''Aphanocrex podarces''. Due to the peculiar shape of the carpometacarpus Olson named this species ''Porzana astrictocarpus''. Olson proceeded on the assumption that the Saint Helena crake was a derivative of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Storrs L
Storrs may refer to: * Storrs (surname) * Storrs, Connecticut Storrs ( ) is a village and census-designated place (CDP) in the New England town, town of Mansfield, Connecticut, Mansfield in eastern Tolland County, Connecticut, United States. The village is part of the Capitol Planning Region, Connecticut, ..., a village where the main campus of the University of Connecticut is located ** Charles and Augustus Storrs, founders of the University of Connecticut and namesakes of the village * Storrs Township, Hamilton County, Ohio * Storrs, South Yorkshire, a rural hamlet within the City of Sheffield, England * Storrs, Cumbria See also * Storrs Hall, a listed building in Cumbria, England * Yealand Storrs, a hamlet in the English county of Lancashire * Storr {{disambiguation, geo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carpometacarpus
The carpometacarpus is a bone found in the hands of birds. It results from the fusion of the carpal and metacarpal bone, and is essentially a single fused bone between the wrist and the knuckles. It is a smallish bone in most birds, generally flattened and with a large hole in the middle. In flightless birds, however, its shape may be slightly different, or it might be absent entirely. It forms the tip of the wing skeleton in birds. To it, most of the primary remiges attach. The alula, by contrast, is formed by the thumb, which does not completely fuse with the other hand-bones. Likewise, the tipmost primaries attach to the phalanx bone The phalanges (: phalanx ) are digital bones in the hands and feet of most vertebrates. In primates, the thumbs and big toes have two phalanges while the other digits have three phalanges. The phalanges are classed as long bones. Structu ...s. To non- biologists the carpometacarpus may be best known from buffalo wings. Buffalo wings ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Taxa Named By Storrs L
In biology, a taxon (back-formation from ''taxonomy''; : taxa) is a group of one or more populations of an organism or organisms seen by taxonomists to form a unit. Although neither is required, a taxon is usually known by a particular name and given a particular ranking, especially if and when it is accepted or becomes established. It is very common, however, for taxonomists to remain at odds over what belongs to a taxon and the criteria used for inclusion, especially in the context of rank-based (" Linnaean") nomenclature (much less so under phylogenetic nomenclature). If a taxon is given a formal scientific name, its use is then governed by one of the nomenclature codes specifying which scientific name is correct for a particular grouping. Initial attempts at classifying and ordering organisms (plants and animals) were presumably set forth in prehistoric times by hunter-gatherers, as suggested by the fairly sophisticated folk taxonomies. Much later, Aristotle, and later still ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Birds Described In 1973
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class (biology), class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the Oviparity, laying of Eggshell, hard-shelled eggs, a high Metabolism, metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweight Bird skeleton, skeleton. Birds live worldwide and range in size from the bee hummingbird to the common ostrich. There are over 11,000 living species and they are split into 44 Order (biology), orders. More than half are passerine or "perching" birds. Birds have Bird wing, wings whose development varies according to species; the only known groups without wings are the extinct moa and elephant birds. Wings, which are modified forelimbs, gave birds the ability to fly, although further evolution has led to the Flightless bird, loss of flight in some birds, including ratites, penguins, and diverse endemism, endemic island species. The digestive and respiratory systems of birds are also uniquely a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Birds Of Saint Helena Island
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweight skeleton. Birds live worldwide and range in size from the bee hummingbird to the common ostrich. There are over 11,000 living species and they are split into 44 orders. More than half are passerine or "perching" birds. Birds have wings whose development varies according to species; the only known groups without wings are the extinct moa and elephant birds. Wings, which are modified forelimbs, gave birds the ability to fly, although further evolution has led to the loss of flight in some birds, including ratites, penguins, and diverse endemic island species. The digestive and respiratory systems of birds are also uniquely adapted for flight. Some bird species of aquatic environments, particularly seabirds and some waterbirds, have fur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zapornia
''Zapornia'' is a recently revalidated genus of birds in the rail family Rallidae; it was included in ''Porzana'' for much of the late 20th century.Garcia-R, Juan C.; Gibb, Gillian C. & Trewick, Steve A. (2014): Deep global evolutionary radiation in birds: Diversification and trait evolution in the cosmopolitan bird family Rallidae. ''Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution, Mol. Phylogenet. Evol.'' 81: 96–108.PDF fulltext/ref> These smallish to tiny rails are found across most of the world, but are entirely absent from the Americas except as wind-blown stray birds (which are regularly encountered on the Atlantic coasts however). A number of species, and probably an even larger number of prehistorically extinct ones, are known only from small Pacific islands; several of these lost the ability to fly in the absence of terrestrial predator (biology), predators. They are somewhat less aquatic than ''Porzana'' proper, inhabiting the edges of wetlands, reedbelts, but also drier grass- a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Extinct Flightless Birds
Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its last member. A taxon may become functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to reproduce and recover. As a species' potential range may be very large, determining this moment is difficult, and is usually done retrospectively. This difficulty leads to phenomena such as Lazarus taxa, where a species presumed extinct abruptly "reappears" (typically in the fossil record) after a period of apparent absence. Over five billion species are estimated to have died out. It is estimated that there are currently around 8.7 million species of eukaryotes globally, possibly many times more if microorganisms are included. Notable extinct animal species include non-avian dinosaurs, saber-toothed cats, and mammoths. Through evolution, species arise through the process of speciation. Species become extinct when they are no longer able to survive in changing conditions or against ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Baillon's Crake
Baillon's crake (''Zapornia pusilla''), also known as the marsh crake, is a small waterbird of the family Rallidae. Distribution Their breeding habitat is sedge beds in Europe, mainly in the east, and across the Palearctic. They used to breed in Great Britain up to the mid-19th century, but the western European population declined through drainage. There has been a recovery in north-western Europe in recent years, with the recolonisation of Germany and the Netherlands, and breeding suspected in Britain; an Irish record in 2012 was the first there since the 1850s. They nest in a dry location in wet sedge bogs, laying 4–8 eggs. This species is migratory, wintering in east Africa and south Asia. It is also a resident breeder in Africa and Australasia. There is a single North American record of this species on Attu Island in September 2000. Subspecies There are at least five subspecies of Baillon's crake: * '' Zapornia pusilla affinis'' in New Zealand * ''Zapornia pusilla pal ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Storrs Olson
Storrs Lovejoy Olson (April 3, 1944 – January 20, 2021) was an American biologist and ornithologist who spent his career at the Smithsonian Institution, retiring in 2008. One of the world's foremost avian paleontologists, he was best known for his studies of fossil and subfossil birds on islands such as Ascension, St. Helena and Hawaii. His early higher education took place at Florida State University in 1966, where he obtained a B.A. in biology, and the University of Florida, where he received an M.S. in biology. Olson's doctoral studies took place at Johns Hopkins University, in what was then the School of Hygiene and Public Health. He was married to fellow paleornithologist Helen F. James. Early life and education Olson was born April 4, 1944, in Chicago, Illinois. His father was physical oceanographer Franklyn C. W. Olson. He was named after his maternal conservationist grandfather P. S. Lovejoy. Franklyn worked at Ohio University's Stone Laboratory on Gibraltar I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Saint Helena
Saint Helena (, ) is one of the three constituent parts of Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, a remote British overseas territory. Saint Helena is a volcanic and tropical island, located in the South Atlantic Ocean, some 1,874 km (1,165 miles) west of the mainland of the continent of Africa, with the Southern African nations of Angola and Namibia on its southeastern coast being the closest nations geographically. The island is around west of the coast of southwestern South Africa, and east of the major seaport city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in South America. Saint Helena measures about and had a population of 4,439 in the 2021 census. It was named after Helena, mother of Constantine I, Saint Helena (AD c.246/248–330), influential mother of the famous Roman Emperor Constantine the Great, Saint Constantine I the Great. (A.D 272–337, reigned 306–337), of the ancient Roman Empire. It is one of the most remote major islands in the world and was uninhabited unt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Prosperous Bay Plain
Prosperous Bay Plain is an area on the eastern coast of Saint Helena, a United Kingdom, British island territory in the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic Ocean. It is the site of the Saint Helena Airport, and is notable for its high invertebrate biodiversity. Geography Prosperous Bay Plain forms part of the eastern arid area of Saint Helena, and covers about 2.25 km2, comprising one of the largest areas of relatively level ground on the island. It was formed 8.5 million years ago by lava flows from Saint Helena's Southwest Volcano. The surface of the plain is covered by rocks, grit and dust, with what little soil there is containing high concentrations of mineral salts. Within the plain there is a 60 hectare (0.6 km2) depression known as the Central Basin, with a level dusty base. This forms a miniature mature desert ecosystem.Ashmole, Philip; & Ashmole, Myrtle. (2004). ''The invertebrates of Prosperous Bay Plain, St Helena''. Commissioned by the St Helena Government and fi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
