Olson S L, James H F
Science. 1982 Aug 13;217(4560):633-5. doi: 10.1126/science.217.4560.633.
Thousands of fossil bird bones from the Hawaiian Islands collected since 1971 include remains of at least 39 species of land birds that are not known to have survived into the historic period; this more than doubles the number of endemic species of land birds previously known from the main islands. Bones were found in deposits of late Quaternary age; most are Holocene and many are contemporaneous with Polynesian culture. The loss of species of birds appears to be due to predation and destruction of lowland habitats by humans before the arrival of Europeans. Because the historically known fauna and flora of the Hawaiian Islands represent only afraction of natural species diversity, biogeographical inferences about natural processes based only on historically known taxa may be misleading or incorrect.
自1971年以来，从夏威夷群岛收集的数千块鸟类化石骨骼中，包含至少39种陆地鸟类的遗骸，这些鸟类在历史时期后已不复存在；这一数量是此前已知的主要岛屿上特有陆地鸟类物种数量的两倍多。这些骨骼是在第四纪晚期的沉积物中发现的；大多数是全新世的，许多与波利尼西亚文化同期。鸟类物种的消失似乎是由于在欧洲人到来之前人类对低地栖息地的捕食和破坏。由于夏威夷群岛历史上已知的动植物群仅占自然物种多样性的一小部分，仅基于历史上已知的分类群对自然过程进行生物地理学推断可能会产生误导或错误。
