Hodgens' waterhen (''Tribonyx hodgenorum'') is an extinct

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species from New Zealand. Its name commemorates the Hodgen brothers who were owners of the Pyramid Valley swamp where the

holotype A holotype (Latin: ''holotypus'') is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of s ...

was discovered. It reached a weight of 280 g and its wings were so reduced that it was unable to fly. It occupied a wide range of habitats, including open forest and grassland along riverbanks.

History

''Tribonyx hodgenorum'' was closely related to the black-tailed native-hen ('' Tribonyx ventralis'') and the Tasmanian native-hen ('' Tribonyx mortierii''). The species was first described by

Ron Scarlett Ronald Jack Scarlett (22 March 1911 – 9 July 2002) was a New Zealand paleozoologist. Early life and family Scarlett was born at Stoke, near Nelson, on 22 March 1911 to Walter Andrew Scarlett and Lilian Elsie (née Cresswell). He was the old ...

as ''Rallus hodgeni'' in 1955.

Storrs L. 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 ...

transferred it into the genus '' Gallinula'' in 1975 and changed its specific epithet to ''hodgenorum'' in 1986. It is only known from

subfossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

material of which the youngest

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midden A midden is an old dump for domestic waste. It may consist of animal bones, human excrement, botanical material, mollusc shells, potsherds, lithics (especially debitage), and other artifacts and ecofacts associated with past human oc ...

record is from the 18th century. Hundreds of bones have been unearthed at Pyramid Valley in the

South Island The South Island ( , 'the waters of Pounamu, Greenstone') is the largest of the three major islands of New Zealand by surface area, the others being the smaller but more populous North Island and Stewart Island. It is bordered to the north by ...

, at

Lake Poukawa Lake Poukawa is a small shallow hardwater lake in the Hawke's Bay Region, North Island, New Zealand. It is located about 20 km south-west of Hastings, New Zealand, close to the settlement of Te Hauke. It is the largest lake lying within a ...

in the

North Island The North Island ( , 'the fish of Māui', historically New Ulster) is one of the two main islands of New Zealand, islands of New Zealand, separated from the larger but less populous South Island by Cook Strait. With an area of , it is the List ...

, and several other sites, indicating that it was once widespread in New Zealand except on the

Chatham Islands The Chatham Islands ( ; Moriori language, Moriori: , 'Misty Sun'; ) are an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean about east of New Zealand's South Island, administered as part of New Zealand, and consisting of about 10 islands within an approxima ...

. The main reasons for its extinction are likely to have been predation by the

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and hunting by human settlers.

References

*A. Tennyson und P. Martinson: ''Extinct birds of New Zealand.'' Te Papa Press, 2006, *Trevor H. Worthy & Richard N. Holdaway: ''The Lost World of the Moa. Prehistoric Life of New Zealand.'' Indiana University Press, Bloomington 2002. *R. N. Holdaway, T. H. Worthy: ''A reappraisal of the late Quaternary fossil vertebrates of Pyramid Valley Swamp, North Canterbury, New Zealand''. New Zealand Journal of Zoology, 1997, Vol. 24: 69–121 0301-4223/2401-069. (PDF fulltext) *Richard N. Holdaway, Trevor H. Worthy, Alan J. T. Tennyson: ''A working list of breeding bird species of the New Zealand region at first human contact''. New Zealand Journal of Zoology, 2001, Vol. 28: 119–18
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*Walter E. Boles: ''A New Flightless Gallinule (Aves: Rallidae: Gallinula) from the Oligo-Miocene of Riversleigh'', Northwestern Queensland, Australia. Records of the Australian Museum (2005) Vol. 57: 179?190.
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*R. N. Holdaway : ''New Zealand's pre-human avifauna and its vulnerability'' 198
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* Tribonyx Late Quaternary prehistoric birds Extinct birds of New Zealand Holocene extinctions Birds described in 1986 {{Gruiformes-stub