iRodrigues Solitaire
Conservation status
Extinct  (c.1730s)
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Aves Order: Columbiformes Family: Columbidae Subfamily: Raphinae Genus: Pezophaps Strickland, 1848 Species: P. solitaria
Binomial name
Pezophaps solitaria (Gmelin, 1789)

The Rodrigues Solitaire (Pezophaps solitaria) was a flightless member of the pigeon order endemic to Rodrigues, Mauritius. It was a close relative of the Dodo. Rodrigues Solitaire. ... The conservation status of a species is an indicator of the likelihood of that species continuing to survive. ... In biology and ecology, extinction is the ceasing of existence of a species or group of species. ... Events and Trends The Great Awakening - A Protestant religious movement active in the British colonies of North America Sextant invented (probably around 1730) independently by John Hadley in Great Britain and Thomas Godfrey in the American colonies World leaders Louis XV King of France (king from 1715 to 1774) George... Scientific classification or biological classification is how biologists group and categorize extinct and living species of organisms. ... Phyla Subregnum Parazoa Porifera Subregnum Eumetazoa Placozoa Orthonectida Rhombozoa Radiata (unranked) Ctenophora Cnidaria Bilateria (unranked) Acoelomorpha Myxozoa Superphylum Deuterostomia Chordata Hemichordata Echinodermata Chaetognatha Xenoturbellida Superphylum Ecdysozoa Kinorhyncha Loricifera Priapulida Nematoda Nematomorpha Onychophora Tardigrada Arthropoda Superphylum Platyzoa Platyhelminthes Gastrotricha Rotifera Acanthocephala Gnathostomulida Micrognathozoa Cycliophora Superphylum Lophotrochozoa Sipuncula Nemertea Phoronida Bryozoa Entoprocta... {{{subdivision_ranks}}} See below Chordates (phylum Chordata) are a group of animals that includes the vertebrates, together with several closely related invertebrates. ... Orders Many - see section below. ... Families Raphidae Columbidae The order Columbiformes includes two families of birds: the Raphidae, to which the extinct Dodo and Rodrigues Solitaires belonged, and the Columbidae, which includes the very widespread and successful doves and pigeons. ... Pigeon redirects here. ... Genera Pezophaps (extinct) Raphus (extinct) Synonyms Raphidae Poche, 1904[verification needed] The Raphinae are a subfamily of extinct flightless birds colloquially called didines or didine birds[1]. They inhabited the Mascarene Islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues, but became extinct through hunting by humans and predation by introduced non-native mammals... Hugh Edwin Strickland (March 2, 1811 - September 14, 1853), was an English geologist, ornithologist and systemist. ... 1848 (MDCCCXLVIII) was a leap year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... In biology, binomial nomenclature is the formal method of naming species. ... Johann Friedrich Gmelin (August 8, 1748 - November 1, 1804) was a German naturalist and botanist. ... 1789 was a common year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ... Pigeon redirects here. ... Scientific classification or biological classification refers to how biologists group and categorize extinct and living species of organisms. ... Endemic, in a broad sense, can mean belonging or native to, characteristic of, or prevalent in a particular geography, race, field, area, or environment; Native to an area or scope. ... Map of Rodrigues Rodrigues (or, incorrectly, Rodriguez) is one of the Mascarene Islands and a dependency of Mauritius. ... Binomial name Raphus cucullatus Linnaeus, 1758 Former range (in red) The Mauritius Dodo (Raphus cucullatus; Didus ineptus is an obsolete name), more commonly just dodo, was a metre-high (three-foot) flightless bird of the island of Mauritius. ...

It was first recorded by François Leguat, the leader of a group of French Huguenot refugees who colonised the island from 1691 to 1693. He described the bird in some detail, including its solitary nesting behaviour. The Huguenots praised the birds for their flavour, especially the young ones. François Leguat (1637 - 1735) was a French explorer and naturalist. ... In the 16th and 17th centuries, the name of Huguenots came to apply to members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France, historically known as the French Calvinists. ... Events March 5 - French troops under Marshal Louis-Francois de Boufflers besiege the Spanish-held town of Mons March 20 - Leislers Rebellion - New governor arrives in New York - Jacob Leisler surrenders after standoff of several hours March 29 - Siege of Mons ends to the city’s surrender May 6... Events January 11 - Eruption of Mt. ...

Due to hunting and predation by introduced cats, the birds soon became scarce, and when Cossigny attempted to get a specimen in 1755, none could be found. The Rodrigues Solitaire probably became extinct sometime in the 1730s or maybe 1760s. The exact date is somewhat difficult to determine: there exist a few reports of "solitaires" from the Mascarenes without mention of which island these came from, and the term was also used for other species with "solitary" habits, such as the enigmatic oiseau bleu and the "Réunion Solitaire"^[1]. 1755 was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... In biology and ecology, extinction is the ceasing of existence of a species or group of species. ... Events and Trends The Great Awakening - A Protestant religious movement active in the British colonies of North America Sextant invented (probably around 1730) independently by John Hadley in Great Britain and Thomas Godfrey in the American colonies World leaders Louis XV King of France (king from 1715 to 1774) George... Events and Trends King George III ascends the British throne in 1760. ... In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biodiversity. ... Binomial name Porphyrio coerulescens (Selys, 1848) Synonyms Apterornis coerulescens Selys, 1848 Cyanornis erythrorhynchus Bonaparte, 1854 The Réunion Swamphen, Réunion Gallinule or Oiseau bleu (Porphyrio coerulescens) is a hypothetical species of extinct rail from Réunion, Mascarenes until now only known from reports of travellers. ... Binomial name Threskiornis solitarius Sélys, 1848 Synonyms Raphus solitarius Victoriornis imperialis Borbonibis latipes The Réunion Sacred Ibis or Réunion Flightless Ibis (see below) (Threskiornis solitarius), is an extinct bird species that was native to the island of Réunion. ...

A large number of bones of the bird have been collected, but there are no mounted specimens. Solitaires are distinguished by an unusual large, gnarled knob of bone at the base of the thumb. In life this knob would have been covered by a thick layer of skin and used as a weapon (a similar, smaller thumb knob is seen in Canada geese). Observations of the solitaire indicate that breeding pairs were highly territorial; presumably they settled disputes by striking each other with the wings. To aid this purpose, the males especially had well-developed knobs on their wrists, up to the size of a musket bullet. Binomial name Branta canadensis (Linnaeus, 1758) Subspecies (Dusky Canada Goose) (Vancouver Canada Goose) (Lesser Canada Goose) (Moffitts Canada Goose) (Giant Canada Goose) (Interior Canada Goose) (Atlantic Canada Goose) The Canada Goose (Branta canadensis), colloquially Greater Canada in North America, belongs to the Branta genus of geese, which contains species... In human anatomy, the wrist is the flexible and narrower connection between the forearm and the hand. ... Muskets and bayonets aboard the frigate Grand Turk. ...

Systematics

The dodo and the Rodrigues Solitaire, collectively termed didines, consititute what is best interpreted as a subfamily Raphinae in the pigeon family, although often, they are considered a full-fledged family Raphidae. Genera Pezophaps (extinct) Raphus (extinct) Synonyms Raphidae Poche, 1904[] The Raphinae are a subfamily of extinct flightless birds colloquially called didines or didine birds[1]. They inhabited the Mascarene Islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues, but became extinct through hunting by humans and predation by introduced non-native mammals following human... ... Pigeon redirects here. ... In biological classification, family (Latin: familia, plural familiae) is 1) a rank or 2) a taxon in that rank. ...

Comparison of mitochondrial cytochrome b and 12S rRNA sequences (Shapiro et al., 2002) isolated from remains of the Rodrigues Solitaire and the Dodo confirms their close relationship. It has also been interpreted to show that the Nicobar Pigeon is their close living relative^[2]. In cell biology, a mitochondrion is an organelle found in the cells of most eukaryotes. ... CoQ Cytochrome c reductase The Coenzyme Q - cytochrome c reductase complex, sometimes called the cytochrome bc1 complex, and at other times Complex III, is the third complex in the electron transfer chain (PDB 1KYO, EC 1. ... A non-coding RNA (ncRNA) is any RNA molecule that functions without being translated into a protein. ... part of a DNA sequence A DNA sequence (sometimes genetic sequence) is a succession of letters representing the primary structure of a real or hypothetical DNA molecule or strand, The possible letters are A, C, G, and T, representing the four nucleotide subunits of a DNA strand (adenine, cytosine, guanine... Binomial name Caloenas nicobarica (Linnaeus, 1758) The Nicobar Pigeon (Caloenas nicobarica) is a pigeon which is a resident breeding bird on small uninhabited islands in Indonesia and the Nicobar Islands. ...

But at least the cytochrome b gene sequence is not well suited to resolve the phylogeny of the Australian, Pacific and Southeast Asian pigeons - the very group to which the Nicobar Pigeon belongs^[3]. Biogeography suggests that the ancestors of the dodo and solitaire indeed derived from some ancient form in the Indo-Australian pigeon lineage(s), but until genes are sequenced that give a less ambiguous picture, the evolutionary connection between the Raphinae and the Nicobar Pigeon must remain a hypothesis not too well supported by the available data. In biology, phylogenetics (Greek: phylon = tribe, race and genetikos = relative to birth, from genesis = birth) is the study of evolutionary relatedness among various groups of organisms (e. ... Biogeography is the science which deals with patterns of species distribution and the processes that result in such patterns. ...

It has been suggested (see Janoo 2005) that the didine group should be dissolved and the dodo and solitaire placed in an existing subfamily of the Columbidae, but this is problematical^[4]. Given the morphological distinctness of the Raphinae, the fact that they constituted a distinct evolutionary lineage, and their closer relationship to some pigeons than to others, it seems best to retain them as a distinct subfamily at least, until better data on their relationships - possibly including fossils of their ancestors - is available. This species' ancestors probably diverged from those of the dodo around the Paleogene-Neogene boundary; see the Raphinae article as to why the often-cited date of "25 mya" is spurious. Pigeon redirects here. ... ... An ammonite fossil Eocene fossil fish of the genus Knightia Petrified wood fossil formed through permineralization. ... Paleogene (alternatively Palaeogene) period is a unit of geologic time that began 65 and ended 23 million years ago. ... Neogene Period is a unit of geologic time consisting of the Miocene, Pliocene, Pleistocene, and Holocene epochs. ... Genera Pezophaps (extinct) Raphus (extinct) Synonyms Raphidae Poche, 1904[verification needed] The Raphinae are a subfamily of extinct flightless birds colloquially called didines or didine birds[1]. They inhabited the Mascarene Islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues, but became extinct through hunting by humans and predation by introduced non-native mammals... In astronomy, geology, and paleontology, mya is an acronym for million years ago and is used as a unit of time to denote length of time before the present. ...

See also

• Extinct birds
• Island gigantism

Since 1500, over 100 species of birds have become extinct, and this rate of extinction seems to be increasing. ... Island gigantism is a biological phenomenon by which the size of animals isolated on an island increases dramatically over generations. ...

References

• BirdLife International (2004). Pezophaps solitaria. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 11 May 2006. Database entry includes justification for why this species is listed as extinct

• Janoo, Anwar (2005): Discovery of isolated dodo bones [Raphus cucullatus (L.), Aves, Columbiformes] from Mauritius cave shelters highlights human predation, with a comment on the status of the family Raphidae Wetmore, 1930. Annales de Paléontologie 91: 167–180. [English with French abstract] DOI:10.1016/j.annpal.2004.12.002 (HTML abstract)

• Johnson, Kevin P. & Clayton, Dale H. (2000): Nuclear and Mitochondrial Genes Contain Similar Phylogenetic. Signal for Pigeons and Doves (Aves: Columbiformes). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 14(1): 141–151. PDF fulltext

• Shapiro, Beth; Sibthorpe, Dean; Rambaut, Andrew; Austin, Jeremy; Wragg, Graham M.; Bininda-Emonds, Olaf R. P.; Lee, Patricia L. M. & Cooper, Alan (2002): Flight of the Dodo. Science 295: 1683. DOI:10.1126/science.295.5560.1683 (HTML abstract) Supplementary information

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. ... The World Conservation Union or International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) is an international organization dedicated to natural resource conservation. ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a permanent identifier (permalink) given to a World Wide Web file or other Internet document so that if its Internet address changes, users will be redirected to its new address. ... Science is the journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). ... A digital object identifier (or DOI) is a permanent identifier (permalink) given to a World Wide Web file or other Internet document so that if its Internet address changes, users will be redirected to its new address. ...

Footnotes