Thirioux's Grey Parrot
| Thirioux’s grey parrot | |
|---|---|
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| Engraving accompanying the journal of Willem Van West-Zanen, which depicts the killing of parrots (bottom) and other animals on Mairitius in 1602. The hunting method mathces that mentioned as used on Thirioux's Grey Parrots | |
| Conservation status | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Aves |
| Order: | Psittaciformes |
| Family: | Psittacidae |
| Genus: | Psittacula |
| Species: | Psittacula bensoni (Holyoak, 1973) |
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| Former range (in red) | |
| Synonyms | |
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Lophopsittacus bensoni |
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Thirioux’s grey parrot (Psittacula bensoni), also known as the Mauritius Grey Parrot, is a little-known extinct species of parakeet which used to inhabit Mauritius Island in the western Indian Ocean. It was only known from descriptions, as well as a single illustration published in a journal describing a voyage in 1602, until sub-fossil bones were described as Lophopsittacus bensoni in 1973.[1] In 2007 The fossils were reinterpreted as belonging to a species of Psittacula instead.
Willem van West-Zanen, who visited Mautirius in 1602, first mentioned the bird and how easy it was to catch it by capturing one and making it call out, which would summon an entire flock:
"...some of the people went bird hunting. They could grab as many birds as they wished and could catch them by hand. It was an entertaining sight to see. The grey parrots are especially tame and if one is caught and made to cry out, soon hundreds of the birds fly around ones’ ears, which were then hit to the ground with little sticks. Also just as tame are the pigeons and turtle doves, that let themselves be caught easily...[2]"
[edit] Réunion grey parrot
A grey parrot described from Réunion may have belonged to the same species. The sailor Bontekoe, who was on Réunion in 1618, stated:
"Coming further inland we found [a] great number of geese, doves, grey parrots and other birds, also many land-turtles; seeing as many as twenty to twenty-five lying in the shade of a tree, so that we could have as many as we desired. The geese were not wise enough to fly up when we pursued them, and we beat them to death with sticks without their making a motion to fly……And what we most did marvel at, when we held one of the parrots and other birds and squeezed it till it screamed, there came all the others from thereabout as if they would free it and let themselves be caught as well, so we had enough of them to eat.[3]"
Cossigny's account from 1764 is the last known sighting.
[edit] References
- ^ D. T. Holyoak: An undescribed extinct parrot from Mauritius. In: The Ibis 1973: S. 417-419
- ^ http://julianhume.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Hume-Mascarene-Parrots.pdf
- ^ Bodde-Hodgkinson & Geyl 1929: 30].
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