North Island giant moa

North Island giant moa
	Skeleton, Natural History Museum of London
Conservation status
	Extinct
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Superorder:	Paleognathae
Order:	Dinornithiformes
Family:	Dinornithidae
Genus:	†Dinornis
Species:	†D. novaezealandiae; (Owen 1843)
Binomial name
	Dinornis novaezealandiae; (Owen 1843)
Synonyms
	List Dinornis giganteus Owen, 1844 ; Dinornis struthoides Owen, 1844 ; Owenia struthoides (Gray 1855) ; Dinornis ingens Owen, 1844 ; Dinornis gigas Owen, 1846 spelling lapse ; Moa ingens (Owen 1844) Reichenbach, 1850 ; Movia ingens (Owen 1844) Reichenbach, 1850 ; Dinornis gracilis Owen, 1855 ; Dinornis dromioides Oliver 1930 non Owen 1846 ; Dinornis hercules Oliver 1949 ; Dinornis gazella Oliver 1949 ; Dinornis excelsus Hutton, 1891 ; Dinornis firmus Hutton, 1891 ; Tylopteryx struthoides (Owen 1844) Hutton, 1891 ; Palapteryx ingens (Owen 1844) Haast 1869 ;

The North Island giant moa (Dinornis novaezealandiae) is one of two extinct moa in the genus Dinornis.

Taxonomy

It is a ratite and a member of the order Dinornithiformes. The Dinorthiformes are flightless birds with a sternum but without a keel. They also have a distinctive palate. The origin of these birds is becoming clearer as it is now believed that early ancestors of these birds were able to fly and flew to the southern areas where they have been found.^[3]

Habitat

This moa lived on the North Island of New Zealand, and lived in the lowlands (shrublands, grasslands, dunelands, and forests).^[3]

Footnotes

^ Brands, S. (2008)
^ Checklist Committee Ornithological Society of New Zealand (2010). "Checklist-of-Birds of New Zealand, Norfolk and Macquarie Islands and the Ross Dependency Antarctica" (PDF). Te Papa Press. Retrieved 4 January 2016.
^ ^a ^b Davies, S. J. J. F. (2003)

References

Brands, Sheila (Aug 14, 2008). "Systema Naturae 2000 / Classification, Genus Dinornis". Project: The Taxonomicon. Retrieved 4 February 2009.
Davies, S.J.J.F. (2003). "Moas". In Hutchins, Michael (ed.). Grzimek's Animal Life Encyclopedia. Vol. 8 Birds I Tinamous and Ratites to Hoatzins (2 ed.). Farmington Hills, MI: Gale Group. pp. 95–98. ISBN 0-7876-5784-0.
Lydekker, Richard (1891). Catalogue of the fossil birds in the British Museum (Natural History). London: British Museum. p. 224. Retrieved 5 January 2010.

External links

North Island Giant Moa. Dinornis Novaezealandiae. by Paul Martinson. Artwork produced for the book Extinct Birds of New Zealand, by Alan Tennyson, Te Papa Press, Wellington, 2006
Holotypes of Dinornis Novaezealandiae in the collection of the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa

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[1] Brands, S. (2008)

[2] Checklist Committee Ornithological Society of New Zealand (2010). "Checklist-of-Birds of New Zealand, Norfolk and Macquarie Islands and the Ross Dependency Antarctica" (PDF). Te Papa Press. Retrieved 4 January 2016.

[Davies-3] Davies, S. J. J. F. (2003)

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