The Woodhen: A Flightless Island Bird Defying Extinction

By Clifford B. Frith

This book tells the fascinating success story of saving the flightless Woodhen of Lord Howe Island. This unique large rail, an iconic and highly endangered Australian bird, was at the very brink of extinction with just 15 individuals found in 1980, when bold and risky actions were taken to save it.

The book begins with the discovery and ecology of Lord Howe Island. It then details the history of the Woodhen, its place among the rails and their evolution of flightlessness, the planning, implementation and trials, tribulations and successes of the captive breeding programme and the way in which the wild population recovered. The ecology, behaviour and breeding biology of this unique flightless island rail are also discussed. The text is accompanied by numerous photographs and drawings.

This is a story of survival, yet the bird remains highly endangered as it is under constant potential threat, which could tip it over the brink and to extinction. The Woodhen provides gripping insights into the potential for both losing and saving vertebrate species.

Winner of a 2014 Whitley Awards Certificate of Commendation for Historical Zoology.

• Language: English
• Publisher: CSIRO PUBLISHING
• Release date: Jun 12, 2013
• ISBN: 9780643108721

Book preview

A Flightless Island Bird Defying Extinction

Clifford B. Frith

© text: Clifford B. Frith 2013

© illustrations: Clifford B. Frith or as credited to others herein 2013

All rights reserved. Except under the conditions described in the Australian Copyright Act 1968 and subsequent amendments, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, duplicating or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. Contact CSIRO PUBLISHING for all permission requests.

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry

Frith, Clifford B.

The Woodhen : a flightless island bird defying extinction /Clifford B. Frith.

9780643108707 (hbk.)

9780643108714 (epdf)

9780643108721 (epub)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Gallirallus – Conservation – New South Wales – Lord Howe Island.

Rails (Birds) – Conservation – New South Wales – Lord Howe Island.

Flightless birds – Conservation – New South Wales – Lord Howe Island

Endangered species – New South Wales – Lord Howe Island.

Lord Howe Island (N.S.W.) – Discovery and exploration.

598.6099481

Published by

CSIRO PUBLISHING

150 Oxford Street (PO Box 1139)

Collingwood VIC 3066

Australia

Telephone:    [phone]

Local call:     1300 788 000 (Australia only)

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Web site:      www.publish.csiro.au

Front cover: The endangered flightless Woodhen of Lord Howe Island. Photograph by C. B. Frith.

Back cover: Lord Howe Island. Photograph by, copyright and courtesy of Ian Hutton.

The author has made every effort to contact copyright holders of images herein, and in the few instances where he failed he invites the copyright holders to contact him.

Set in Adobe Garamond Pro 10.5/13.6

Edited by Peter Storer Editorial Services

Cover and text design by James Kelly

Typeset by diacriTech, Chennai, India

Index by Dawn W. Frith and Clifford B. Frith

Printed in China by 1010 Printing International Ltd

CSIRO PUBLISHING publishes and distributes scientific, technical and health science books, magazines and journals from Australia to a worldwide audience and conducts these activities autonomously from the research activities of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO). The views expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of, and should not be attributed to, the publisher or CSIRO. The copyright owner shall not be liable for technical or other errors or omissions contained herein. The reader/user accepts all risks and responsibility for losses, damages, costs and other consequences resulting directly or indirectly from using this information.

Original print edition:

The paper this book is printed on is in accordance with the rules of the Forest Stewardship Council®. The FSC® promotes environmentally responsible, socially beneficial and economically viable management of the world's forests.

Frontispiece. Based upon a 48 × 32 cm watercolour of the Woodhen by George Raper, unofficial artist aboard the H.M.S. Sirius, in 1790. Raper Drawing 71, by permission of the Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London. See also Fig. 4.5.

Contents

Preface

Acknowledgements

Chapter 1 Discovery of Lord Howe Island and its nature

Chapter 2 Origins of Lord Howe Island and its wildlife

Chapter 3 Rails, the Woodhen and its origins

Chapter 4 Evolution and extinction of flightless rails

Chapter 5 Early knowledge of the Woodhen, its demise and causes

Chapter 6 Assessing the post 1930s Woodhen population

Chapter 7 Planning and implementation of Woodhen management

Chapter 8 The revived Woodhen population

Chapter 9 Woodhen ecology and behaviour

Chapter 10 Woodhen breeding biology

Chapter 11 The future of the Woodhen

Appendix 1. Results of the Woodhen Captive Breeding Programme

Appendix 2. Comprehensive bird list for the Lord Howe Island Group

Appendix 3. The nomenclatural history of the Woodhen

Appendix 4. Some bird species saved from likely extinction

Appendix 5. Scientific names of plants and animals not in the text and some words defined in order appearing within chapters

Bibliography

Index

Dedicated to

The Woodhen, John Disney, Glenn Fraser, Dawn Frith, Peter Fullagar, Robert Harden, Ian Hutton, Ben Miller, the Lord Howe Island Board, the Islanders and all who value this remarkable, resilient, robust, rare rail.

Woodhen. By D. M. Reid-Henry, from Greenway (1958).

Preface

A stout, bantam-sized, ground-dwelling, island-confined bird – a boldly curious member of the rail family – evolved to become flightless in the absence of natural predators. For millennia it fearlessly walked unmolested throughout its isolated 7 million year old subtropical island home in the western South Pacific Ocean. Due to geographic, oceanic and anthropological circumstances, people failed to come across this exceptionally lovely place, now called Lord Howe Island, until 1788. They first settled it as recently as 1834 and they came to call the trusting and abundant, highly edible, terrestrial bird ‘Woodhen’. Within a mere 138 years of that first human settlement, only 20 or fewer individuals of the endemic Woodhen remained alive on the island (and therefore planet Earth), including as few as five breeding pairs.

The arrival of humanity upon pristine islands such as this wrought disaster for countless creatures inhabiting them. Not only did seafaring peoples decimate larger animals they found on remote islands, notably sea and land turtles and larger birds, they also introduced numerous exotic animals and plants. They killed wildlife to eat while anchored at the islands or carried them off aboard their vessels to provision their crews at sea or to trade to other people elsewhere.

Fortunately a few enlightened and sensitive people came to care deeply about the pending extinction of the Woodhen. They convinced others that urgent and immediate action was needed if the bird might, just, be saved. Incredibly, within 10 years of the 1980 start of a 4-year captive breeding programme, some 200 Woodhens were living on the island. Today Woodhen numbers fluctuate between approximately 200 and 250, this apparently being the maximum that the remaining suitable habitat on Lord Howe Island can support.

In view of its past trials and tribulations, coming across one or more wild Woodhens foraging about the ground litter today is a moving and exciting experience. As one enjoys the bird, its tameness and adaptations to island life, one might ponder the geological origins and human discovery of its remote island home. This might lead to thoughts of the island's colonisation by a flying ancestral small rail species and its subsequent evolution into a large flightless one, its human-induced rapid decline to the very brink of extinction and its subsequent human-orchestrated recovery.

This book is, then, an historical and biological summary of the dramatic decline and amazing resurrection of the world's Woodhen population. It is a success story that this text seeks to tell and illustrate comprehensively. In doing so, it also reviews the geological origins and history of discovery of Lord Howe Island, its location and ecology, and the systematic saving of the Woodhen and the study of its biology. It is in part a celebration of the saving of the species from extinction. The Woodhen story should greatly encourage us all to strive harder to save other species teetering on the precipice of extinction: for most creatures facing oblivion today do so as a result of our own exponentially increasing numbers and ecological footprint.

Charles Darwin's 1835 visit to the Galapagos Islands in the eastern Pacific Ocean permitted him to demonstrate to the world for the first time the great significance of life forms on geographically isolated islands. Such islands provide profound insights into evolutionary processes. In 1844 Darwin wrote, ‘an island would be a far more fertile source, as far as we can judge, of new specific forms [i.e. species of life] than a continent’ (in Browne 2003: 514). Remote islands are particularly interesting, often beautiful, places for biologists to visit and study. Thus it is not surprising that I met the zoologist who was to become my partner in all things, now Dawn W. Frith, on Aldabra Atoll. Because of its remoteness, it consisting of several islands, and its thousands of resident giant tortoises, some early biologists referred to Aldabra as ‘the Galapagos of the Indian Ocean’. Dawn had been sent there to study insects and I was sent there – independently and 8 months later – to study some birds unique to the atoll that included the flightless Aldabra Rail; see Chapters 2 and 4.

The Woodhen. By Henrik Grönvold, from Mathews (1928).

I had long appreciated the desirability of a book detailing the remarkable Woodhen story. After all, it is not only an intriguing flightless bird in its own right but is also isolated on a remote, beautiful, oceanic island as a species brought back from the very brink of extinction by caring people. Over two decades ago, Dawn and I encouraged eminent senior Australian ornithologists John Disney and Peter Fullagar, two of the group of dedicated people significantly involved in the bird's recovery, to write a book about the Woodhen. While they made an enthusiastic start on one their professional obligations and circumstances prevented them from continuing with it.

In January 2008 Dawn and I visited Lord Howe Island for the first time. From our approaching aircraft we could see what a gem of an island it is. Its thinly elongated length is utterly dominated by the bulbous southern end, consisting of two massive, towering, vegetated, shear-sided mountains falling near vertically to the sea. In contrast to this, and to the cliff-edged lower hills of the northern end, the coast either side of the narrow middle length of the island is dotted with blindingly pale sandy beaches. These, the lush vegetation, and the dark exposed rock outcrops contrast dramatically with the bright and palest aqua-blue of the extensive and protective central western coastal lagoon. This in turn contrasts sharply with the deep and dark blue sea adjacent to it and surrounding the rest of the island. Getting closer to the island permits one to see extensive areas of rich green crowns of handsome palm trees, behind beach crests and also at higher elevations.

While there I became deeply impressed with the island, its origins, history, beauty, resident islanders, and with the Woodhen and its biology and the story of its recovery from near extinction. My first encounter with the Woodhen was enchanting. Having thought I had heard one foraging some distance away, within an extensive coastal stand of Kentia Palms, I tapped a small stone against a large boulder to attract it. In no time, two adult and two immature Woodhens approached me closely. They are fundamentally fowl-like birds that, at a distance, are a uniform rich warm reddish-brown – slightly greyer about the face. At close quarters, a conspicuous regular blackish barring is readily apparent on the longer wing feathers. Stout long grey legs support their deliberate strong gait. Their roughly 50 mm long, robust and powerful, decurved pinkish-horn beak serves as an all-purpose foraging trowel, which is also capable of killing a lone rat in defence or as prey.

With the full consent and kind support of my esteemed friends and colleagues John Disney and Peter Fullagar, I commenced work on the present book. I exhaustively researched the pertinent literature about the island, its origins and history and the bird itself to produce a draft of over 50 000 words. Disney and Fullagar then generously sent to me copies of initial first draft texts that they had produced as chapters of their intended book. These had been roughly drafted before mid December 1992. While I did not use any of these draft texts directly, I was fortunate in having them as part of the research material to be synthesised into this work. Two of their drafts chapters helped me so much that these are acknowledged at the head of Chapter 7 and Appendix 1. John and Peter stimulated a substantial long-sighted effort that saved a magnificent bird species from certain extinction. There are surely few legacies that anyone could aspire to that can compare with instigating the saving of a highly distinctive and geographically extremely restricted species of vertebrate animal from extinction.

Lord Howe Island seen from the north-west. Photograph by, copyright and courtesy of Ian Hutton.

Three other people most deeply involved in the history of recovery and study of the Woodhen are biologists Ben Miller, Glenn Fraser or Lourie-Fraser and Robert Harden: the first in the initial assessment of its status, biology and suitability for reproduction in captivity; the second for most successfully designing and carrying out the Woodhen Captive Breeding Programme; and the third for coordinating and performing a systematic field study of the bird's biology by observing individually marked birds. The vital contributions of these three colleagues are readily apparent in the subsequent chapters. Previously published information is cited in the text by its author and date (e.g. Hutton 1990), with the full details in the Bibliography. Material provided to me by direct personal communication is indicated as such by the conventional abbreviation pers. comm.

In mentioning Australian bird species, I have, with two notable exceptions, followed those names applied in the 2008 Systematics and Taxonomy of Australian Birds by Les Christi-dis and Walter E. Boles. I must explain my use of the common name ‘Woodhen’, because several others are widely in use. On Lord Howe Island and, to lesser extent, elsewhere in Australasia the bird is simply known as the Woodhen, without further embellishment. Unfortunately, some authors have used ‘Wood Hen’, and it is to be hoped that this will not be so in the future. The bird has also been called Rufous-winged Rail (Sharland 1929) and in some widely used standard books dealing with the rails as a whole it is referred to as the Lord Howe Wood Rail (Ripley 1977) or Lord Howe Rail (Taylor 1996; Taylor and van Perlo 1998). In the above authoritative recent publication by Christidis and Boles ‘Lord Howe Woodhen’ is used. Given the contemporary desire to keep the common names of birds as short as possible, I can see why ‘Lord Howe’ is used rather than ‘Lord Howe Island’, but the latter provides a far more useful name to people unfamiliar with the bird or what only ‘Lord Howe’ might mean. The latter suggests a British peer, and indeed the island was named after one, but the bird was not named after the peer Lord Howe but after Lord Howe Island; see Chapter 1. I therefore use the delightfully simple ‘Woodhen’ (a) for brevity and convenience (b) because there is only one ‘Woodhen’ in ornithology (c) because only ‘Woodhen’ has been predominantly applied to the species ever since its discovery (d) because only ‘Woodhen’ is used in the most recent definitive handbook on Australian birds (Marchant and Higgins 1993) and (e) because the above 2008 publication is the accepted authority on Australian bird names and uses Woodhen rather than Wood Hen. Thus readers should understand that the bird this book deals with is unfortunately now ‘officially’ known as the ‘Lord Howe Woodhen’. I much prefer just ‘Woodhen’, but if a longer name simply must be used then, for the sake of it making sense and being correct, please let it be ‘Lord Howe Island Woodhen’.

To avoid tedious frequent repetition of ‘Lord Howe Island’ in the text I also use ‘Lord Howe’ and ‘the Island’. Because ‘Lord Howe Island Board’ is also used several times in some chapters, I sometimes abbreviate it to ‘the Board’. Figure 2.1 is a map showing the location of most places mentioned in the text. Places mentioned but not shown on this map are those located within the greater Settlement or airport area of the island, most of which are mentioned only in Appendix 1. This appendix comprehensively presents the results of the amazingly successful Woodhen Captive Breeding Programme, as recorded contemporaneously by Glenn Fraser, the responsible aviculturist. Given the necessary detail involved, I present these results as an appendix rather than within the body of the book. The valuable and most interesting insights they provide into the biology, daily lives, reproductive productivity and behaviour of the Woodhen – as well as the intriguing reproductive history of captive individuals and pairs – make their availability here fundamentally important to readers.

Extracting material covering the Woodhen history subsequent to the 1930s, including the Captive Breeding Programme results, at times proved complex and difficult – involving numerous unpublished private and ‘in-house’ reports, notes and personal communications. I have diligently sought the truth on the few occasions when confronted with conflicting facts or numbers and can only hope that I have been successful in all cases. If any errors remain, they are entirely my own and can in no way reflect upon those kind people whose advice and opinions I have consulted.

The text largely follows a linear chronology as the dramatic history of Lord Howe Island, the Woodhen, its rescue and study unfolds – and I have sought to maintain the chronology whenever possible. The only significant exception is where I must include results of studies performed before and after the Woodhen Captive Breeding Programme. An inconsequential issue resulting from this treatment is that limited results of studies of wild Woodhen biology prior to the Captive Breeding Programme in Chapter 6 are discrete from those in Chapters 8 to 10. This is to some large extent alleviated, however, by the fact that the earlier studies were limited to the small, isolated, and thus possibly atypical, remnant population on the Mt Gower summit. In contrast, subsequent work on the Woodhens released from the breeding programme and their progeny involve studies of wild birds over an extensive part of the Island, including Mt Gower. Results of the latter, by Robert Harden and colleagues, must therefore provide a more balanced account of Woodhen ecology and biology. Thus I stress here, and elsewhere, the different chapter locations and the varying geographical and ecological breadth of Woodhen biology data to be found herein.

Acknowledgements

I thank Dawn Frith for her inexpressibly appreciated love, companionship, interest, advice, copy editing, index production, constructive criticism and unsurpassably diverse support. To John Disney and Peter Fullagar I owe a considerable debt of thanks: they played a pivotal role in bringing the Woodhen back from the brink of extinction. Both graciously accepted my proposed intention to write this book and generously supported my efforts throughout my researches by providing published and unpublished texts, information, photographs, constructive discussion, advice and criticism. Draft chapters they wrote – including information about exotic introductions, Woodhen studies and conservation efforts – were of particular value. Peter generously prepared and supplied the sonograms.

Glenn Fraser, who was responsible for the success of the Woodhen Captive Breeding Programme kindly made his notes available to Disney and Fullagar, and these are edited and paraphrased in Appendix 1 herein. My gratitude to Fraser is as great as is my admiration of his avicultural skills. In addition, he generously read drafts of Chapter 7 and Appendix 1 to offer constructive criticism, resulting in improvements and provided discussion and photographs.

Robert Harden, who long studied wild Woodhens, most generously made available a draft of a paper by him, John Robertshaw, David McFarland and Justin Billing, the important significance of which to our understanding of Woodhen biology is clear herein. Robert also provided valuable constructive thought and criticism on drafts of several chapters. David Priddle, Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water (NSW), kindly provided and discussed Woodhen banding data and also offered valuable constructive criticism on several draft chapters.

I am particularly grateful to Ian Hutton, long-term resident Lord Howe Island ornithologist, naturalist, conservationist and fine photographer, for generously sharing his profound knowledge of the island and its avifauna in general and the Woodhen in particular. I first saw his 2005 book The Woodhen: from the Brink of Extinction on my visit to Lord Howe in January 2008 and it played a part in stimulating my enthusiasm for undertaking this one. Ian also kindly provided constructive criticism of the draft chapters of this book and most generously provided particularly fine and pertinent photographs.

My good and admired friends Stanley and Kaisa Breeden kindly read the first half of the book and offered helpful constructive thought, discussion and criticism. Walter Boles and Patricia Egan of the Australian Museum kindly provided advice and material, for which I am most grateful, as did my good friends Stephen Garnett, Frank Steinheimer and Eddy Mills. For generously contributing valuable images I thank Frank Allen, John Disney, Glenn Fraser, Peter Fullagar, Ian Hutton, Helen Lansdowne, Lord Howe Island Museum, Ederic Slater and Ian Woodforth. My thanks also to the Australian State and National libraries and their staff for invaluable help in finding various texts, illustrations and permission to reproduce as is indicated in captions. I also sincerely thank those who provided photographs and permission to reproduce them, as is acknowledged in their captions.

I thank the Australian Bird and Bat Banding Scheme for responding favourably to my request for Woodhen banding data. The Lord Howe Island Board also kindly provided the results of their annual Woodhen capture and banding data. As Robert Harden and colleagues have assessed and synthesised much of these data in the meantime, I actually did little of it myself. Every capture and examination of a bird requires dedication, effort and skill and it is a pleasure to acknowledge all of those good people concerned, while too numerous to list here.

I enthusiastically express my real appreciation of the members of the Lord Howe Island Board, past and present, for their far-sighted actions in instigating environmental studies of the ecology of their wonderful island in general and the Woodhen in particular. As a result of initial such studies the Woodhen was found to be in an extremely precarious situation: literally walking toward extinction. The Board promptly responded by contributing to, and seeking additional, funds and support required in attempting to save the Woodhen. In this regard, the then New South Wales National Parks and Wildlife Foundation also deserves credit. Most fortunately, they proved successful beyond expectations, thanks to the scientists, national parks rangers, aviculturists, islanders and many others involved. Finally, it is my pleasure to sincerely thank all those people at CSIRO Publishing concerned with the production and publication of this volume, notably John Manger, Tracey Millen and Deepa Travers.

Reference material that I have accumulated in the process of putting the present work together is deposited at the Lord Howe Island Museum.

Clifford B. Frith

Malanda, tropical north Queensland, Australia

Chapter 1

Discovery of Lord Howe Island and its nature

Captain James Cook departed England on 26 August 1768 aboard HMS, or HM Bark, Endeavour of the British Navy. He sailed his vessel down the coast of South America and around Cape Horn into the broad Pacific Ocean and thence westward to Tahiti. He was ordered by the British Admiralty to observe the transit of Venus from Tahiti and he did so, if rather unsatisfactorily in that his readings did not match those of his own second party of astrological observers. He then continued westwards to New Zealand and onward towards the setting sun to discover the east coast of Australia, which he sighted on 20 April 1770. On 29 April he landed at Botany Bay and claimed the land, as he knew it then. During the first week of May, the good Captain formally named Botany Bay, hoisted the English Colours there and had inscribed on the trunk of a tree his ship's name, the date and other details.

This new great southern land was subsequently given scant attention until the British Government decided to establish a founding settlement at Sydney Cove, Port Jackson, New South Wales, New Holland. Transported convicts very predominantly populated this settlement. On 13 May 1787 the First Fleet, consisting of the eleven vessels the HMS Sirius, HM armed tender Supply, the store ships The Golden Grove, Fishburn and Borrowdal and the transports Alexander, Scarborough, Friendship, Charlotte, Prince of Wales and Lady Penrhyn, was dispatched from England. The fleet, including around 560 convict men, 190 convict women and 550 other souls including officers, marines, ships' crews and their families, was under the command of Governor and Captain Arthur Phillip of the Navy, as Commodore of the squadron (Fig. 1.1). The details of the voyage of the fleet and the subsequent establishment of the founding Australian settlement are beyond the scope of the present work, and are detailed in many other books dealing with the early history of Australia.

The origin of the ship that was to become HM Brig Supply is lost in the mists of maritime history. The ship was apparently built and launched in America, as an armed trader, in 1759. The Admiralty of the British Empire commissioned her in October 1786. She carried naval supplies between the River Thames and British Channel ports for 27 years. As a Royal Navy armed tender, the brig Supply was to then play a significant role in the foundation of Australia. The Supply was the oldest and the smallest of the First Fleet to sail to Australia, being only some 170 tons and 21.3 m, or 70 feet, in length (Fig. 1.2). Carrying 50 souls she led the First Fleet for most of the voyage, in large part due to her small size and turn of speed, skippered by Lieutenant Henry Lidgbird Ball (Fig. 1.3). She left Portsmouth on 13 May 1787, and arrived at Botany Bay on 18 January 1788. Only 7 weeks later, on 6 March 1788, Lieutenant Philip Gidley King and 22 settlers raised the Union Jack on Norfolk Island and proceeded to clear land for agriculture, thus making the island the second British settlement in the South Pacific region, as a satellite to the New South Wales colony.

Figure 1.1: Governor Arthur Phillip. Detail; National Portrait Gallery, London.

Figure 1.2: HM Brig Supply; by, copyright and courtesy of marine artist Frank Allen.

Governor Phillip wisely rejected Botany Bay as a suitable site for settlement and had his fleet sail to Port Jackson, to be later known as Sydney Harbour, which they reached on 26 January and proceeded to unload their various cargoes. All of the ships of the First Fleet except the Supply and Sirius then returned to England in July 1788, leaving the infant colony dependent upon these two vessels for communication with Norfolk Island and the rest of the world.

Figure 1.3: Lieutenant Henry Lidgbird Ball, Commander of HM Brig Supply, was described as class conscious, uncouth and churlish. A fine navigator, he retired as Rear-Admiral in 1818. The National Library of Australia - nla.pic-an4549405.

What was originally named the Berwick, but became the Sirius, was built in 1780, probably by Christopher Watson and Co. who also built the Prince of Wales, another ship of the First Fleet. The Berwick had a displacement of 511 tons and, after being burnt in a fire, was purchased for rebuilding by the Royal Navy in 1786 and renamed Sirius after the southern star (Fig. 1.4). She then carried 16 guns and sailed under Captain John Hunter who took command of her in 1787. In making the voyage to Australia, she carried Arthur Phillip, the appointed Governor of the future colony. The Sirius departed Portsmouth within the First Fleet and arrived at Port Jackson on 26 January 1788, remaining there until 2 October 1788 when she