Mees's nightjar (''Caprimulgus meesi'') is a member of the nightjar family (Caprimulgidae) described as new to science in 2004. It is a representative of the large-tailed nightjar complex found on

Flores Flores is one of the Lesser Sunda Islands, a group of islands in the eastern half of Indonesia. Including the Komodo Islands off its west coast (but excluding the Solor Archipelago to the east of Flores), the land area is 15,530.58 km2, and th ...

and

Sumba Sumba ( id, Pulau Sumba) is an island in eastern Indonesia. It is one of the Lesser Sunda Islands and is in the province of East Nusa Tenggara. Sumba has an area of , and the population was 779,049 at the 2020 Census; the official estimate as a ...

, Indonesia. Previously unrecognised as a separate taxon due to its lack of morphological distinctness, Sangster and Rozendaal (2004) described this new species on the basis of its vocalisations, which differ significantly from those of the large-tailed nightjar races resident on other islands in the

Lesser Sundas The Lesser Sunda Islands or nowadays known as Nusa Tenggara Islands ( id, Kepulauan Nusa Tenggara, formerly ) are an archipelago in Maritime Southeast Asia, north of Australia. Together with the Greater Sunda Islands to the west they make up ...

. The species is named after Gerlof Mees, former curator of the

Natural History Museum, Leiden Naturalis Biodiversity Center ( nl, Nederlands Centrum voor Biodiversiteit Naturalis) is a national museum of natural history and a research center on biodiversity in Leiden, Netherlands. It was named the European Museum of the Year 2021. Altho ...

References

* Sangster, G. and F. Rozendaal (2004
''Territorial songs and species-level taxonomy of nightjars of the ''Caprimulgus macrurus'' complex, with the description of a new species.''

Zoologische Verhandelingen (Leiden) ''Zoologische Verhandelingen'' was a Dutch scientific journal covering research in zoology. It was published between 1948 and 2002 by the Rijksmuseum van Natuurlijke Historie in Leiden Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is ...

Vol. 350 pp. 7–4
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Mees's nightjar Mees's nightjar (''Caprimulgus meesi'') is a member of the nightjar family (Caprimulgidae) described as new to science in 2004. It is a representative of the large-tailed nightjar complex found on Flores and Sumba, Indonesia. Previously unrecogn ...

Birds of Flores Endemic birds of Indonesia Birds of Sumba

{{Caprimulgiformes-stub