Gallirallus australis

The weka, also known as the Māori hen or woodhen is a flightless bird species of the rail family. It is endemic to New Zealand. Some authorities consider it as the only extant member of the genus Gallirallus. Four subspecies are recognized but only two (northern/southern) are supported by genetic evidence.

Gallirallus australis

JJ Harrison · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Also called
wekaPBDB
Sits inside
GallirallusPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Coelurosauria
Life habit
ground dwelling, solitaryPBDB, for Theropoda
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Theropoda

Time the record covers

At most 129 thousand years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 129 ka and 0 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Pleistocene — about 8 of 26 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 18 of 26 occurrences147 ka–126 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences126 ka–105 ka Mya — about 1 occurrence105 ka–84 ka Mya — about 1 occurrence84 ka–63 ka Mya — about 1 occurrence63 ka–42 ka Mya — about 1 occurrence42 ka–21 ka Mya — about 1 occurrence21 ka–0 Mya — about 19 occurrences629 ka0 Mya

26 occurrences of Gallirallus australis on record, most of them in the Holocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

26 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

1 formation

Hillgrove — 45.13°S, 170.97°E

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The named rock units Gallirallus australis has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 23 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Gallirallus australis and its relatives

Holocene

Where Gallirallus australis and its relatives were recorded in the Holocene.

Found in the same rock

169 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 26 sites for Gallirallus australis, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

6 references

Each of the 26 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Gallirallus australis

Credit
JJ Harrison
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

CT scan

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Gallirallus australis · UMZC:Vertebrates:303.A

Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itGallirallus through timeFormations of the HoloceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Sparrman 1786)