Myzomela pallidior Hartert

Mary, 2011, Type Specimens Of Birds In The American Museum Of Natural History Part 9. Passeriformes: Zosteropidae And Meliphagidae, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 2011 (348), pp. 1-193 : 57

Myzomela pallidior Hartert

Myzomela pallidior Hartert, 1898b: 21 (St. Aignan Island).

Now Myzomela albigula pallidior Hartert, 1898 . See Coates, 1990: 240, and Higgins et al., 2008: 637.

LECTOTYPE: AMNH 692674 , adult male, said to have been collected on Misima (5 St. Aignan ) Island but probably in the Engineer or Conflict Group, Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea, on 31 July 1894, by Albert S. Meek (no. 725). From the Rothschild Collection.

COMMENTS: Hartert did not designate a type in the original description, mentioning only one male with wing measuring 73 mm and the single female, both therefore syntypes; nor did he mention one in the following publication on Meek’s entire ‘‘Misima’’ collection ( Hartert, 1899b: 210). Rothschild and Hartert (1903a: 224) later listed Meek’s specimen, male no. 725 as the type, thereby designating it the lectotype. This specimen, with wing measuring 73 mm, also bears a Rothschild type label. There were six specimens collected, but because syntypes were designated in the original description (ICZN, 1999: 77, Art. 72.4.6), only the female listed there is a paralectotype: AMNH 692673, female, collected on Kimuta Island (not on St. Aignan 5 Misima Island), on 13 December 1897, by collectors for A.S. Meek (no. 1178).

LeCroy and Peckover (1998) investigated specimens supposedly collected on Misima by Meek that had not been found there by subsequent visitors and found that specimens collected on 31 July and after 11 September were collected on smaller islands near Misima; the 31 July specimens probably came from the Engineer group west of Misima and the ones after 11 September from Kimuta Island just off the eastern end of Misima. This form has been collected by others on other small islands near Misima but not on Misima itself. While it is not certain that it was the Engineer Group from which this type specimen was secured, it is known from Meek’s correspondence that he collected birdwing butterflies there on his way to Misima; but the butterfly specimens have no exact date. The Conflict Group, the closest group of islands west of Misima, is also another possible stop; we know that Meek collected on Misima on 2 August and that there is no specimen recorded for 1 August ( LeCroy and Peckover, 1998: 226, 228), suggesting that he could have been en route on that date.