The Ascension crake (''Mundia elpenor'') is an extinct flightless bird that previously lived on

Ascension Island Ascension Island is an isolated volcanic island, 7°56′ south of the Equator in the South Atlantic Ocean. It is about from the coast of Africa and from the coast of South America. It is governed as part of the British Overseas Territory o ...

in the

South Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the "Old World" of Africa, Europe and ...

. Like many other flightless birds on isolated islands, it was a

rail Rail or rails may refer to: Rail transport *Rail transport and related matters *Rail (rail transport) or railway lines, the running surface of a railway Arts and media Film * ''Rails'' (film), a 1929 Italian film by Mario Camerini * ''Rail'' ( ...

. It was declared extinct by Groombridge in 1994;

BirdLife International BirdLife International is a global partnership of non-governmental organizations that strives to conserve birds and their habitats. BirdLife International's priorities include preventing extinction of bird species, identifying and safeguarding ...

confirmed this in 2000 and 2004. The bird was

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

to Ascension Island. Numerous

subfossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved in ...

bones of the bird have been found in deposits at the base of vertical fumaroles.

Peter Mundy Peter Mundy ( fl. 1597 – 1667) was a seventeenth-century British factor, merchant trader, traveller and writer. He was the first Briton to record, in his ''Itinerarium Mundi'' ('Itinerary of the World'), tasting '' Chaa'' (tea) in China and trav ...

, a 17th-century merchant and traveler gave an account of the bird and made a sketch of it when he visited Ascension Island in June 1656. It was described by Mundy as: It most likely lived in the near-desert areas of the island and primarily ate

sooty tern The sooty tern (''Onychoprion fuscatus'') is a seabird in the family Laridae. It is a bird of the tropical oceans, returning to land only to breed on islands throughout the equatorial zone. Taxonomy The sooty tern was described by Carl Linnaeu ...

(''Sterna fuscata'') eggs. It is probable that it became extinct after rats were introduced to the island in the 18th century, but it may have survived until the introduction of feral cats in 1815. The bird was regarded by Storrs Olson as a relative of ''

Atlantisia rogersi The Inaccessible Island rail (''Laterallus rogersi'') is a small bird of the rail family, Rallidae. Endemic to Inaccessible Island in the Tristan Archipelago in the isolated south Atlantic, it is the smallest extant flightless bird in the worl ...

'', but recent analysis (Bourne et al., 2003) has shown that the differences between the two are greater than previously appreciated. The new genus ''Mundia'' (named after the discoverer Peter Mundy) was created in 2003.

References

BirdLife Species Factsheet
*del Hoyo, J., Elliott, A., & Sargatal, J., eds. '' Handbook of Birds of the World'' Vol. 3: 140, 175. Lynx Edicions, Barcelona. . * Bourne, W. R. P., Ashmole, N. P. & Simmons K. E. L.: ''A new subfossil night heron and a new genus for the extinct rail from Ascension Island, central tropical Atlantic Ocean'' in ''Ardea''; 91, Heft 1, 2003: pp. 45–5
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Ascension crake The Ascension crake (''Mundia elpenor'') is an extinct flightless bird that previously lived on Ascension Island in the South Atlantic Ocean. Like many other flightless birds on isolated islands, it was a rail. It was declared extinct by Groom ...

† A dagger, obelisk, or obelus is a typographical mark that usually indicates a footnote if an asterisk has already been used. The symbol is also used to indicate death (of people) or extinction (of species). It is one of the modern descendan ...

Extinct flightless birds Extinct animals of Africa Bird extinctions since 1500

Extinct birds of Atlantic islands Species made extinct by human activities {{ascension-stub