Hawkins's rail (Diaphorapteryx hawkinsi), also called the giant Chatham Island rail or in Moriori as mehonui, is an extinct species of flightless rail. It was endemic to the Chatham Islands east of New Zealand. It is known to have existed only on the main islands of Chatham Island and Pitt Island. Hawkins's rail was the largest terrestrial bird native to the Chatham Islands, around 40 centimetres (16 in) tall and weighing about 2 kilograms (4.4 lb). It had a long, downward curving beak. Historic accounts likely referring to the bird by the name "mehonui" suggest that it was red-brown in colour, and it has been compared to the weka in ecological habits, using its beak to probe decaying wood for invertebrates. Hawkins's rail likely became extinct due to overhunting by the islands native inhabitants, the Moriori, and the bird is known from skeletal remains found in their kitchen middens.
Taxonomy In 1892, Henry Ogg Forbes received several unusual fossil bones originating from the Chatham Islands sent by William Hawkins, amongst these was a distinctive skull, which Forbes realised represented a now extinct species of rail. He named the species Aphanapteryx hawkinsi in honour of Hawkins, placing the bird in the same genus as the extinct red rail from the Mascarene island of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean. Forbes proposed that a land bridge had once existed between Mauritius and the Chatham Islands, as part of his proposed lost continent of "Antipodea". Forbes personally went to the Chatham Islands later that year to do additional collecting. Later in 1892, on the advice of Edward Newton, Forbes placed Hawkins's rail into the separate genus Diaphorapteryx, though he later changed his mind and reverted to considering it to be a member of the genus Aphanapteryx. Between 1894 and 1895, Sigvard Jacob Dannefaerd collected several thousand bones of Hawkins's rail as part of a collection of "many hundreds of thousands" of bones collected from the Chatham Islands on behalf of the financier and zoologist Walter Rothschild. In 1896, the idea of a close relationship between the red rail and Hawkins's rail and the biogeographic connection between Mauritius and the Chatham Islands was criticised by Charles William Andrews due to there being no other overlapping species between the islands fauna, and Hans Friedrich Gadow considered the similar morphology of the two birds to be explained by parallel evolution.
Evolution A 2014 genetic study found that the closest relative of Hawkins's rail was the invisible rail (Habroptila wallacii), endemic to the island of Halmahera in the Maluku Islands, Indonesia, with their last shared common ancestor existing around 10 million years ago. The two rails were then in turn found to be most closely related to the genus Gallirallus.
Description
Skeleton In life, the bird is estimated to have been approximately 40 centimetres (16 in) tall and weighed about 2 kilograms (4.4 lb). The wings of the bird are greatly reduced. The legs are robust with elongate toes. The beak is elongate and curves downwards (decurved).
Historical accounts No contemporary European accounts of the bird exist, and it was long thought that Hawkins's rail became extinct hundreds of years prior to European discovery of the Chatham Islands in the early 19th century, with Millener 1999 suggesting that the extinction of Hawkins's rail took place between approximately 1550 and 1700 AD. However, historic accounts based on recollections by Moriori of a bird referred to as the Mehonui suggest that Hawkins's rail may have become extinct much later. An 1895 letter from Sigvard Dannefaerd belonging to Walter Rothschild describes the appearance, behaviour, and Moriori hunting method concerning the species:
The Large Rail that Forbes Clased as Aphenapteryx the Moriori Name for same is "Mehonui" (nui mens Large) I hunted ap the oldest Moriori Chief on the Island and ther tradition of the Bird is, it ware Larger than a Goase and had a verry loud Cry like Tue-ck it always walked with the Head down pecking in decaed wood on the Ground, the would often catch them by walking stret ap to them from the front of them, but they could not cam over them from the side, and the yused to Sleep together in Colonies and the Morioris yused to find out ware a Colony had ther Sleeping plase, then sneek quietly ap and make a rush and Kill the hole Colony. The described them as of a Dull Brick Red Colour A second account was published by Alexander Shand in 1911, in his writings on Moriori cuisine:
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