A recovery plan that identifies individual species accounts and actions needed statewide to aid 21 species of forest birds in Hawai`i was released today by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The plan covers a group of species for which the threats and limiting factors are similar, and for which similar actions are needed for recovery.
"This plan represents a tremendous effort by a multitude of federal, state, and private partners," said Patrick Leonard, field supervisor for the Pacific Islands Fish and Wildlife Office. "Such a large-scale plan can only be successfully implemented through cooperative conservation.?
Most of the species covered in this plan are now found only in the upper elevation rain forests above 4,000 feet on the islands of Hawai`i, Maui, and Kaua`i. Two exceptions are the palila, which is limited to dry upland forests on Mauna Kea on Hawai`i, and the O`ahu `elepaio, which occurs in native and nonnative forests on O`ahu at elevations as low as 330 feet. Subfossil records and observations by early naturalists in the Hawaiian Islands indicate that most of the species once had much larger distributions and occurred at lower elevations.
Previous recovery efforts for Hawaiian forest birds have been guided by earlier recovery plans for Hawai`i forest birds, the palila, Kaua`i forest birds, and Maui-Moloka`i forest birds. Separate plans still guide recovery actions for the `io or Hawaiian hawk, and `alal? or Hawaiian crow.
Many of the recovery recommendations in this plan ? including forest protection, forest restoration, predator control, fencing and removal of feral ungulates (pigs, goats, sheep, and deer), and the control of avian disease ? will benefit the `io and `alal?, which use many of the same habitat areas found on the of Hawai`i as some of the forest birds described in this plan.
The primary threats to Hawaiian forest birds are habitat loss and degradation by agriculture, urbanization, cattle grazing, browsing by feral ungulate species, timber harvesting, and invasion of nonnative plant species into native-dominated plant communities; predation by alien mammals; and diseases carried by alien mosquitoes.
Several Hawaiian forest birds now occur in such low numbers and in restricted ranges that they are threatened by natural processes, such as inbreeding depression and skewed sex ratios, and by natural and man-made factors such as hurricanes, periodic vegetation die-back, and wildfires.
The plan contains criteria needed to downlist species from endangered to threatened status and for delisting or removing them from the list of federally protected species. The 21 species covered in this plan include:
in; - 1. O`ahu `elepaio (Chasiempis sandwichensis ibidis) in; - 1. K?ma`o or large Kaua`i thrush (Myadestes myadestinus) in; - 1. Oloma`o or Moloka`i thrush (Myadestes lanaiensis rutha) in; - 1. Puaiohi or small Kaua`i thrush (Myadestes palmeri) in; - 1. Kaua`i `?`? (Moho braccatus) in; - 1. `?`? (Psittirostra psittacea) in; - 1. Palila (Loxioides bailleui) in; - 1. Maui parrotbill (Pseudonestor xanthophrys) in; - 1. Kaua`i `akialoa (Hemignathus procerus) in; - 1. Kaua`i nukupu`u (Hemignathus lucidus hanapepe) in; - 1. Maui nukupu`u (Hemignathus lucidus affinis) in; - 1. `Akiap?l?`au (Hemignathus munroi) in; - 1. Hawai`i creeper (Oreomystis mana) in; - 1. O`ahu alauahio or O`ahu creeper (Paroreomyza maculata) in; - 1. K?k?wahie or Moloka`i creeper (Paroreomyza flammea) in; - 1. Hawai`i `?kepa (Loxops coccineus coccineus) in; - 1. Maui `?kepa (Loxops coccineus ochraceus) in; - 1. `?kohekohe or crested honeycreeper (Palmeria dolei) in; - 1. Po`ouli (Melamprosops phaeosoma) in; - 1. `Akikiki or Kaua`i creeper (Oreomystis bairdi) in; - 1. Bishop's `?`? (Moho bishopi)A draft of the plan was released for public review and comment in October 2003. After the 60-day review period, comments from the public and scientific peer reviewers were considered and incorporated into the final plan.
Availability of the recovery plan was announced in the Federal Register on September 28, 2006. The recovery plan is currently available online through the Fish and Wildlife Service's website at
