Within a forested limestone landscape of Papua New Guinea lives a shy, striking bird that’s new to science. This bird is also incredibly rare and may already be endangered, according to a recent study.
Researchers have photographed fewer than 10 individuals of the newly described hooded jewel-babbler (Ptilorrhoa urrissia) in about 10 years of monitoring — all within a 100-hectare (250-acre) area of Iagifu Ridge, located in the Agogo mountain range of Papua New Guinea.
Extrapolating from these figures, “we estimate that Iagifu Ridge may support some 50-100 individuals,” Iain Woxvold, study co-author from the Australian Museum Research Institute, told Mongabay by email. “However, an accurate estimate will require further research, and the actual number may well be fewer.”
Jewel-babblers are ground-dwelling birds with distinctive black masks and white throats or cheeks. Four species were known until now, all from the island of New Guinea.
Woxvold and colleagues first chanced upon the hooded jewel-babbler in 2017. They had set up camera traps to survey biodiversity on Iagifu Ridge, and among the images were those of two birds on the forest floor with distinctive coloration. “We were fairly certain it was a new taxon in 2017 … However, at that stage we were still not 100% sure that it was a new species,” Woxvold said.
More of these birds turned up during subsequent camera-trapping surveys in 2019 and later. “It was strange and wonderful to see them in those early photographs!” Woxvold said. “In 2022, we also set a video camera nearby, and were extremely lucky to film a sequence of a calling male.”
The researchers compared the birds in the images and video with museum specimens and field photographs of other jewel-babbler species. The male and female hooded jewel-babblers exhibited notably different feather colors and patterns from those of the other species, confirming them as new to science.
Conventionally, taxonomic descriptions of new-to-science species require specimens — one or more killed individuals — that are deposited in museums as a reference for future comparisons. But the hooded jewel-babbler has been described solely on the basis of camera-trap images and video.
A combination of factors “make it both acceptable and important to describe the species without a specimen,” Woxvold said.
These include the difficulty of capturing the elusive bird, he said. Its only known population on Iagifu Ridge is also tiny, and the area is subject to various threats like domestic cats and dogs, climate change impacts, and habitat fragmentation from roads and infrastructure for petroleum production facilities, the authors write.
“[G]iven available data on the species’ status and distribution, we feel that taking a whole animal specimen from the only known population would be unethical on conservation grounds,” Woxvold said. “For these reasons, we felt strongly that naming the species now is both taxonomically well-founded and important to encourage appropriate research and conservation action.”
Banner image: Newly described hooded jewel-babblers (Ptilorrhoa urrissia) from Papua New Guinea. Image courtesy of I. Woxvold/B. Gamui.
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