Nestor notabilis
The kea is a species of large parrot in the family Strigopidae that is endemic to the forested and alpine regions of the South Island of New Zealand. About 48 cm (19 in) long, it is mostly olive-green, with brilliant orange under its wings, and has a large, narrow, curved, grey-brown upper beak. Its omnivorous diet consists mainly of roots, leaves, berries, nectar, and insects, but also includes carrion. It was once killed for bounty due to concern by sheep farmers that it attacked livestock, especially sheep. The kea is now uncommon, and received absolute protection under the Wildlife Act in 1986.
Mark Whatmough · CC BY 2.0 · 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
- keaPBDB
- Sits inside
- NestorPBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Coelurosauria
- Life habit
- ground dwelling, solitaryPBDB, for Theropoda
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Theropoda
- Mass
- 26 gWikidata
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.
5 occurrences of Nestor notabilis 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
5 occurrences- Pleistocene40%
- Holocene60%
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
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The named rock units Nestor notabilis has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 3 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Nestor notabilis and its relatives
HoloceneWhere Nestor notabilis and its relatives were recorded in the Holocene.
Found in the same rock
92 taxa- Gallirallus australis4 sites
- Anas chlorotis3 sites
- Chenonetta finschi3 sites
- Corvus moriorum3 sites
- Coturnix novaezelandiae3 sites
- Cyanoramphus3 sites
- Nestor meridionalis3 sites
- Pachyptila turtur3 sites
- Tadorna variegata3 sites
- Alauda arvensis2 sites
- Anthornis melanura2 sites
- Apteryx australis2 sites
- Ardenna grisea2 sites
- Callaeas cinereus2 sites
- Cnemiornis calcitrans2 sites
- Coenocorypha aucklandica2 sites
- Dinornis giganteus2 sites
- Emeus crassus2 sites
- Eudyptula minor2 sites
- Euryapteryx geranoides2 sites
- Fulica prisca2 sites
- Harpagornis moorei2 sites
- Hemiphaga novaeseelandiae2 sites
- Larus dominicanus2 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 5 sites for Nestor notabilis, 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
2 references- Quaternary fossil fauna of South Canterbury, South Island, New Zealand3
- Late-Pleistocene avifaunas from Cape Wanbrow, Otago, South Island, New Zealand2
Each of the 5 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. Each entry links to doi.org. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content3
Picture of Nestor notabilis
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Mark Whatmough
- Licence
- CC BY 2.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
CT scan
- Source
- MorphoSource
- Credit
- NMNH - Division of Birds
- Licence
- In Copyright
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
- Specimen
- Nestor notabilis · USNM:BIRDS:USNM 344934
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
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Kea”
- 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 itNestor through timeFormations of the HoloceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Gould 1856