Haast's Eagle
Artist's rendition of a Haast's Eagle attacking moa.
Conservation status
Extinct (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Aves Order: Falconiformes Family: Accipitridae Genus: Harpagornis Species: H. moorei
Binomial name
Harpagornis moorei Haast, 1872

Haast's Eagle (Harpagornis moorei), was a massive, now extinct eagle that once lived on the South Island of New Zealand. Also known as the Harpagornis Eagle^{[citation needed]}, it was the largest eagle to have ever lived. It is believed that the Māori called it Pouakai; the often-cited name Hokioi (or hakawai) refers to the aerial display of the New Zealand Snipe — specifically, the extinct South Island subspecies.^[1] Download high resolution version (1375x1101, 329 KB) Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Genera Anomalopteryx (bush moa) Euryapteryx Megalapteryx (upland moa) Dinornis (giant moa) Emeus Pachyornis Moa were giant flightless birds native to New Zealand. ... The conservation status of a species is an indicator of the likelihood of that species remaining extant either in the present day or the near future. ... Image File history File links Status_iucn3. ... For other uses, see Extinction (disambiguation). ... The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (also known as the IUCN Red List and Red Data List), created in 1963, is the worlds most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of plant and animal species and can be found here. ... Scientific classification redirects here. ... For other uses, see Animal (disambiguation). ... Typical Classes See below Chordates (phylum Chordata) are a group of animals that includes the vertebrates, together with several closely related invertebrates. ... For other uses, see Bird (disambiguation). ... Families Accipitridae Pandionidae Falconidae Sagittariidae The order Falconiformes is a group of about 290 species of birds that include the diurnal birds of prey. ... Subfamilies Elaninae Perninae Milvinae Accipitrinae Buteoninae Aegypiinae Circinae Circaetinae The Accipitridae is one of the two main families within the order Falconiformes (the diurnal birds of prey). ... Latin name redirects here. ... Sir Johann Franz Julius von Haast (May 1, 1824 - August 15, 1887) was a German geologist. ... Year 1872 (MDCCCLXXII) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian Calendar (or a leap year starting on Saturday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ... For other uses, see Extinction (disambiguation). ... Genera Several, see text. ... The South Island The South Island is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand, the other being the more populous North Island. ... This article is about the Māori people of New Zealand. ... Binomial name Coenocorypha aucklandica (Gray, 1845) The New Zealand Snipe Coenocorypha aucklandica, also known as the Subantarctic Snipe, is a species of snipe endemic to New Zealand. ...

Description

A model on display at Te Papa of a Haast's Eagle attacking a moa with its large talons.

Female Haast's Eagles weighed 10 to 15 kg (22 to 33 lb), and males weighed 9 to 10 kg (20 to 22 lb). They had a wingspan of roughly 2.6 to 3 m (8 to 10 ft) at most, which was short for a bird of the eagle's weight (the largest Golden Eagles and Steller's Sea Eagles may have a wingspan of almost the same length), but aided them when hunting in the dense forests of New Zealand. Haast's Eagle is sometimes portrayed as evolving towards flightlessness, but this is not so; rather, it represents a departure from its ancestors' mode of soaring flight and towards higher wing loading and maneuverability. The strong legs and massive flight muscles would have enabled the birds to take off with a jumping start from the ground, despite their great weight. The tail was almost certainly long (up to 50 cm (20 inches), in female specimens) and very broad, further increasing maneuverability and providing additional lift.^[2] Total length was perhaps up to 1.4 m (4.7 ft) in females, with a standing height of around 90 cm (about 3 ft) tall or even slightly more. Haast's Eagle preyed on large, flightless bird species, including the moa which was up to 15 times its weight.^[2] It attacked at speeds up to 80 km per hour (50 mph), often seizing its prey's pelvis with the talons of one foot and killing with a blow to the head or neck with the other. Its size and weight indicate a bodily striking force equivalent to a cinder block landing on the target from a height of 80 feet. The eagle had power in its talons easily sufficient to snap a human's neck, or puncture the skull. Its large beak was used to rip into the internal organs and death was induced by blood loss. In the absence of other large predators or scavengers, a Haast's Eagle could have easily monopolised a single large kill over a number of days. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (1728x2304, 3734 KB) Summary A model of a Haasts Eagle attacking a moa on display at Te Papa, photographed by DONeil. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (1728x2304, 3734 KB) Summary A model of a Haasts Eagle attacking a moa on display at Te Papa, photographed by DONeil. ... Te Papa (Our Place), The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is the national museum of New Zealand. ... Genera Anomalopteryx (bush moa) Euryapteryx Megalapteryx (upland moa) Dinornis (giant moa) Emeus Pachyornis Moa were giant flightless birds native to New Zealand. ... Kg redirects here. ... Look up pound in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... This article is about the unit of length. ... This article is about a foot as a unit of length. ... For other uses, see Golden Eagle (disambiguation). ... Binomial name Haliaeetus pelagicus (Pallas, 1811) Red: breeding only Green: resident all year Dark blue: winter only Light blue: vagrant range. ... This article is about a community of trees. ... Flightless birds evolved from flying ancestors; there are about forty species in existence today. ... Flight is the main mode of locomotion used by most of the worlds bird species. ... In aerodynamics, wing loading is the loaded weight of the aircraft divided by the area of the wing. ... A centimetre (American spelling centimeter, symbol cm) is a unit of length that is equal to one hundredth of a metre, the current SI base unit of length. ... An inch (plural: inches; symbol or abbreviation: in or, sometimes, ″ - a double prime) is the name of a unit of length in a number of different systems, including English units, Imperial units, and United States customary units. ... The lift force, lifting force or simply lift is a mechanical force generated by a solid object moving through a fluid. ... Genera Anomalopteryx (bush moa) Euryapteryx Megalapteryx (upland moa) Dinornis (giant moa) Emeus Pachyornis Moa were giant flightless birds native to New Zealand. ... “km” redirects here. ... The pelvis (pl. ... Cat claw A claw is a curved pointed appendage, found at the end of a toe or finger or, in arthropods, of the tarsus. ... For a person who scavenges, see Waste picker. ...

Early human settlers in New Zealand (the Māori arrived about 1,000 years ago) also preyed heavily on large flightless birds including all moa species, eventually hunting them to extinction. This caused the Haast's Eagle to become extinct around 1400^[3] when the last of its food sources dwindled out. It may also itself have been hunted by humans: a large, fast bird of prey that specialised in hunting large bipeds may have been perceived as a threat by Māori — for a creature that could kill a moa weighing 180 kg (400 lb), an adult human may have been a viable prey alternative.^[4] This article is about modern humans. ... Orders Accipitriformes     Cathartidae     Pandionidae     Accipitridae     Sagittariidae Falconiformes     Falconidae A bird of prey or raptor is a bird that hunts its food, especially one that preys on mammals or other birds. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... Genera Anomalopteryx (bush moa) Euryapteryx Megalapteryx (upland moa) Dinornis (giant moa) Emeus Pachyornis Moa were giant flightless birds native to New Zealand. ...

Comparitive morphology of Haast's Eagle with its closest living relative the Little Eagle.

A noted explorer, Charles Douglas, claims in his journals that he had an encounter with two raptors of immense size in Landsborough River valley (probably in the 1870s), and shot and ate them.^[5] These birds might have been a last remnant of the species, but this is very unlikely; there had not been suitable prey for a population of Haast's Eagle to maintain itself for about half a millennium, and 19th century Māori lore was adamant that the pouakai was a bird not seen in living memory. Still, Douglas' observations on wildlife are generally trustworthy; a more probable explanation, given that the alleged three-metre wingspan of Douglas' birds is unlikely to have been more than a rough estimate, is that the birds were Eyles' Harriers. This was the largest known harrier (the size of a small eagle) — and a generalist predator — and although it is also assumed to have gone extinct in prehistoric times, its dietary habits alone make it a more likely candidate for late survival. Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... A group of organisms is said to have common descent if they have a common ancestor. ... Little Eagle is a census-designated place (CDP) in Corson County, South Dakota, United States. ... Orders Accipitriformes     Cathartidae     Pandionidae     Accipitridae     Sagittariidae Falconiformes     Falconidae A bird of prey or raptor is a bird that hunts its food, especially one that preys on mammals or other birds. ... The Landsborough River is located in New Zealands South Island. ... // The invention of the telephone (1876) by Alexander Graham Bell. ... Alternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical) (18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801-1900 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar. ... Binomial name Circus eylesi The Eyles Harrier is an extinct bird of prey which lived in New Zealand. ... Genera Circus Geranospiza Polyboroides A Harrier is any of several species of diurnal birds of prey which fly low over meadows and marshes and hunt or harry small animals or birds (hence their common name). ...

Until recent human colonisation, the only terrestrial mammals found on New Zealand were three species of bat, one of which has recently become extinct. Free from mammalian competition and predatory threat, birds occupied or dominated all major niches in the New Zealand animal ecology. Moa were grazers — functionally similar to deer or cattle elsewhere — and Haast's Eagle hunters, filling the same niche as top-niche mammalian predators such as tigers or brown bears. Subclasses & Infraclasses Subclass †Allotheria* Subclass Prototheria Subclass Theria Infraclass †Trituberculata Infraclass Metatheria Infraclass Eutheria For the folk-rock band see The Mammals. ... “Chiroptera” redirects here. ... Two lichens on a rock, in two different ecological niches In ecology, a niche; (pronounced nich, neesh or nish)[1] is a term describing the relational position of a species or population in its ecosystem[1]. The ecological niche; describes how an organism or population responds to the distribution of... For the journal, see Ecology (journal). ... This article is about the ruminent animal. ... For general information about the genus, including other species of cattle, see Bos. ... Apex predators (also alpha predators, superpredators, or top-level predators) are predators that, as adults, are not normally preyed upon in the wild in significant parts of their ranges. ... For other uses, see Tiger (disambiguation). ... Bears are big and have big ass, thats why bears are hot, and thats why cats are not. ...

DNA analysis has shown that this raptor is most closely related to the much smaller Little Eagle as well as the Booted Eagle (both recently reclassified as belonging to the genus Aquila.^[6]) and not, as previously thought, to the large Wedge-tailed Eagle^[7] Thus, Harpagornis moorei may be reclassified as Aquila moorei, pending confirmation. H. moorei may have diverged from these smaller eagles as recently as 700,000 to 1.8 million years ago. Its increase in weight by 10 to 15 times over that period is the greatest and fastest evolutionary increase in weight of any known vertebrate. This was made possible in part by the presence of large prey and the absence of competition from other large predators. Genetic fingerprinting, DNA testing, DNA typing, and DNA profiling are techniques used to distinguish between individuals of the same species using only samples of their DNA. Its invention by Dr. Alec Jeffreys at the University of Leicester was announced in 1985. ... Little Eagle is a census-designated place (CDP) in Corson County, South Dakota, United States. ... Binomial name (Gmelin, 1788) Synonyms Aquila minuta Brehm, 1831 Hieraaetus pennatus The Booted Eagle (Aquila pennata) (formerly Hieraaetus pennatus) is a medium-sized bird of prey. ... For other uses, see Genus (disambiguation). ... Binomial name Aquila audax (Latham, 1802) The Wedge-tailed Eagle or Eaglehawk (Aquila audax) is a very large Australasian raptor and the most common of all the worlds large eagles. ... This article is about evolution in biology. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

Haast's Eagle was first classified by Julius von Haast, who named it Harpagornis moorei after George Henry Moore, the owner of the Glenmark Estate where bones of the bird had been found. Sir Johann Franz Julius von Haast (May 1, 1824 - August 15, 1887) was a German geologist. ... George Henry Moore (1810 - 1870) served as MP for Mayo. ...

See also

• Late Quaternary prehistoric birds
• Island gigantism

Prehistoric birds are various taxa of birds that became extinct before recorded history, or more precisely, before they could be studied alive by bird scientists. ... Island gigantism is a biological phenomenon by which the size of animals isolated on an island increases dramatically over generations. ...

References

Indiana University, founded in 1820, is a nine-campus university system in the state of Indiana. ... Genera See text. ... Nuclear DNA is DNA contained within a nucleus of eukaryotic organisms. ... Mitochondrial DNA (some captions in German) Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is the DNA located in organelles called mitochondria. ...

External links

• New Zealand Birds Limited Haast Eagle page
• New Zealand Eagle website
• NZ Conservation Trust (Charles Douglas' reputed sighting)