Fred Ruhe
Well-known member
A paper I overlooked:
JULIAN P. HUME, 2017
A high price to pay: new light on the extinction of the Pink-headed Duck Rhodonessa caryophyllacea
FORKTAIL 33 (2017): 56–63
The Pink-headed Duck Rhodonessa caryophyllacea has always appeared to be mysterious and rather uncommon, and has not been reliably recorded since the 1940s; it is now almost certainly extinct. Comparatively few specimens were taken in the first two decades of the twentieth century. In 1923, Sir David Ezra, resident in Calcutta, offered a reward for live specimens and during the next six years at least 16 live birds were sent by him to his brother, Alfred, who owned a menagerie at Foxwarren Park, England. This increased collecting pressure on the remaining population may have been the ultimate reason for its extinction. I suggest that the last claimed observations of wild birds, between 1947 and 1949, are open to considerable doubt as no specimens were preserved. Although there was the offer of another substantial reward from 1930 onwards, this was never claimed and it is more likely that the last observation of the species in the wild occurred over a decade earlier, in 1935. This means that the last probable record of the species, that of a captive bird held in Calcutta, was in November 1948.
Free pdf: https://www.researchgate.net/public...he_Pink-headed_Duck_Rhodonessa_caryophyllacea
Enjoy,
Fred
JULIAN P. HUME, 2017
A high price to pay: new light on the extinction of the Pink-headed Duck Rhodonessa caryophyllacea
FORKTAIL 33 (2017): 56–63
The Pink-headed Duck Rhodonessa caryophyllacea has always appeared to be mysterious and rather uncommon, and has not been reliably recorded since the 1940s; it is now almost certainly extinct. Comparatively few specimens were taken in the first two decades of the twentieth century. In 1923, Sir David Ezra, resident in Calcutta, offered a reward for live specimens and during the next six years at least 16 live birds were sent by him to his brother, Alfred, who owned a menagerie at Foxwarren Park, England. This increased collecting pressure on the remaining population may have been the ultimate reason for its extinction. I suggest that the last claimed observations of wild birds, between 1947 and 1949, are open to considerable doubt as no specimens were preserved. Although there was the offer of another substantial reward from 1930 onwards, this was never claimed and it is more likely that the last observation of the species in the wild occurred over a decade earlier, in 1935. This means that the last probable record of the species, that of a captive bird held in Calcutta, was in November 1948.
Free pdf: https://www.researchgate.net/public...he_Pink-headed_Duck_Rhodonessa_caryophyllacea
Enjoy,
Fred
