Mascarinus mascarinus ( Linnaeus, 1771 )

HUME, JULIAN PENDER, 2007, Reappraisal of the parrots (Aves: Psittacidae) from the Mascarene Islands, with comments on their ecology, morphology, and affinities, Zootaxa 1513 (1), pp. 1-76 : 36-41

Mascarene parrot Mascarinus mascarinus ( Linnaeus, 1771)

Perroquets un peu plus gros que pigeons, ayant le plumage de couleur de petit gris, un chaperon noir sur la teste, le becq fort gros, & couleur de feu, Dubois, 1674: 172.

Les uns sont de la grosseur d’une poulle, de couleur grise, le bec rouge, Feuilley, 1705: 129., in Mission à I’lle Bourbon du Sieur Feuilley en 1704. Recueil trimestriel de documents et travaux inédits pour servir á l’histoire des Mascareignes françaises. [Original not seen.].

Psittacus Mascarinus Brisson 1760: 315 (nonbinomial).

Psittacus mascarinus, Linnaeus, 1771: 524 ; Hahn, 1834: 54, pl.39 (probably based on the type specimen held in the MNHN, Paris).

Mascarin, Daubenton, 1779: pl. 35; Buffon, 1779: 120, pl.v; Mauduyt, 1784: 194.

Mascarine Parrot, Latham, 1781: 265, n.72.

Perroquet Mascarin, Levaillant, 1805: II, 171, pl. 189, “ Madagascar,” errore.

Mascarinus madagascariensis Lesson, 1831: 189 , “ Madagascar,” ex Levaillant.

Coracopsis mascarina ; Wagler, 1832.: 679; Pelzeln, 1863: 934; Gray, 1846:.407, n,i.

Mascarinus obscurus (non Psittacus obscurus Linnaeus ); Bonaparte, 1854: 154. (Linnaeus, Psittacus obscurus, 1758 , X, 97, ex Hasselquist M.S – identified with Psittacus mascarinus in error. See Appendix 1).

Vaza mascarina ; Schlegel, 1864: 71.

Psittacus madagascariensis ; Finsch, 1868: 306 (Finsch was unfamiliar with the history of this parrot and still thought it origins were in Madagascar); Finsch, ibid (footnote); Pelzeln, 1873:.32.

Coracopsis obscura ; Gray, 1870: pl.159, n. 8262.

Coracopsis mascarinus ; Newton & Newton, 1876: 289.

Mascarinus mascarinus ; Salvadori, 1891: 421, Réunion.

Mascarinus duboisi Forbes ; 1879: 304, 306, fig.306; Milne-Edwards & Oustalet; 1893: 191, pl. 1.

Holotype: skin (unsexed) MNHN 211 ( Fig. 16 ). This may be the same specimen that was described by Brisson (1760). See below and Forbes (1879).

Measurements: See Appendix 3, tables 1–11.

Type locality: Réunion Island, Mascarenes

Distribution: Réunion Island and possibly Mauritius (see below)

Etymology: As for the genus.

Referred material: Skin (unsexed) NMW 50.688. For fossil material see Mourer-Chauviré et al (1999).

The Mascarene parrot Mascarinus mascarinus is known from two ancient skins, the type in Paris (Milne- Edwards and Oustalet 1893) and a partially albinistic specimen in NMW ( Greenway 1967). The presence of white feathers in this specimen is almost certainly a result of a long period in captivity ( Schifter 1994). This specimen, listed as ‘ 5828 Parrot, a curious variety, America,’ was obtained at the sale of the Leverian Museum, London in 1806 ( Pelzeln 1873; Sassi 1940; Schifter 1994).

Diagnosis: As for the genus.

Description and comparison: See Appendix 2f.

Remarks: Facts concerning the natural colouration and date of extinction of the Mascarene parrot have long been documented (Hahn 1834; Newton & Newton 1876; Milne-Edwards & Oustalet 1893; Rothschild 1907b; Hachisuka 1953; Forshaw 1989; Day 1981; Fuller 1987, 2001), all based on the account of Hahn (1834). Hahn supposedly saw the last of the species, an aged specimen living in the King of Bavaria’s menagerie in 1834, although other evidence suggests that this may not have been the case (Hume 2004; Hume & Prys-Jones 2005). Hahn’s (1834: 54) account reads:

bill red; base of bill black; head and throat bluish-grey; remainder of body brownish-red, lower parts paler; tail white at base, remaining half brownish-red; feet blackish. ORIGIN: Madagascar. WHERE FOUND: Unknown. FOOD: Fruits. BREEDING: Unknown. CHARACTERS: It is not very lively and its call is harsh. There is a living example in the menagerie of King Maximilian of Bavaria at Munich on which the illustration is based [my translation].

Although Hahn supposedly based his illustration of the Mascarinus in his book, Ornithologischer Atlas: Papageien ( Fig. 17b ) on this living example, it is almost a direct copy of Martinet’s plate ( Fig. 17a ) in Buffon (1779: pl. 35) executed some 50 to 60 years before. After the death of the king on 13 October 1825, the menagerie was auctioned off on 25–28 August 1826, and an inventory lists all species in precise detail (Anonymous 1826). No Mascarene parrot is on the list. Furthermore, such a rare parrot would surely have been mounted after death, but no such specimen was preserved. Without giving reasons, Newton & Newton (1876, p. 287) suspected Hahn’s veracity on the subject, but one important fact is overlooked: Hahn’s account of a live bird says nothing about the date of his observation. The book was published in 1834 and, in Hahn’s defense, it is possible for him to have made an observation well before that date, as the collection of data and final publication may have taken many years. Hahn died the following year in 1835 ( Schifter 1994).

Nonetheless, inconsistencies in Hahn’s description (i.e. date and provenance of observation and plagiarized image of Mascarinus ), cast doubt on his statement. Although not conclusive, it is very doubtful that Hahn saw a living Mascarene parrot as late as 1834, if at all, and he may have derived his description and illustration from other sources, even hearsay evidence.

The 1834 date of extinction is, therefore, unfounded and the species had almost certainly died out long before then. The Mascarene parrot was last mentioned alive on Réunion in the 1770s ( Cheke 1987) and captive birds were alive in Paris during the 1780s and described by Mauduyt (1784):

The Mascarin is found at Ile Bourbon [=Réunion]; I have seen several alive in Paris, they were rather gentle birds; they had in their favour only that the red beak contrasted agreeably with the dark background of their plumage; they had not learnt to talk (translation from Cheke and Hume in prep.)

No records indicate that they survived longer, which suggests that Mascarinus probably became extinct before 1800.

It has been suggested that Mascarinus may have also once inhabited Mauritius (e.g. Hachisuka 1953; Greenway 1967), based on the account of Peter Mundy (1608–67 [1914]), quoting his observation of ‘ russet parrots’. Réunion and Mauritius share a number of genera, including parrots, so a possibility exists that Mascarinus occurred on both islands, which can only be resolved by the discovery of fossil material on Mauritius.

The accounts of Dubois (1674), Feuilley (1704 [1939]) and Borghesi in 1703 ( Lougnon 1992) include descriptions of live Mascarinus on Réunion. At least 3 specimens also reached France alive ( Brisson 1760; Mauduyt 1784; Levaillant 1805; Finsch 1867; Milne-Edwards & Oustalet 1893) and two of these live birds were described, the first and most detailed by Brisson (1760) and a second by Mauduyt (1784) (see above). A third specimen belonged to the Cabinet Aubry ( Newton & Newton 1876; Milne-Edwards & Oustalet 1893), eventually becoming part of the Cabinet du Roi ( Cheke 1987). Buffon (1779: pl 35); Martinet (1787); Levaillant (1805) and Hahn (1834) followed by Rothschild (1907b), Hachisuka (1958) and Forshaw (1989), describe or depict a brown bird with bluish-lilac head – a colouration that has become the orthodox image today. Dubois (1674), however, described Mascarinus as Petit-gris, which is the colour of the dark phase of the Eurasian red Squirrel ( Sciurus vulgaris ) ( Mourer-Chauviré et al. 1999), a variable dark blackish grey/ brown (pers. obs.). Feuilley (1705 [1939]) in 1704 mentions Mascarinus and other parrots on Réunion (see Réunion Grey parrot), and Brisson (1760:315) described a captive Mascarinus as follows:

Upperparts of head and neck clear (ash) grey. Back, rump, underparts of neck, breast, belly, sides, legs, scapular feathers, uppercoverts of tail very-dark (ash) grey. Wing feathers of the same colour. The tail is composed of 12 feathers: the two median ones are also very-dark (ash) grey. All the lateral ones are of the same colour, except that they have a little white at their base. The eyes are surrounded by a naked skin, bright red. Pupil black, iris red. The base of the superior half of the beak is also surrounded by a red naked skin in which the nostrils are placed. Beak similarly red. Legs pale flesh. Claws grey-brown. I am unaware from which country it is found. I have seen it living in Paris [my translation]. As above

The overall grey colouration is in direct contrast with more modern interpretations. Buffon (1779:120) also described Mascarinus , based on a mounted specimen:

Its bill is red; a grey hood covers the back of the head and neck; the rest of the body is brown; the quills of the tail, which are brown for two-thirds of their length, are white at their origin [my translation].

Finsch (1867) also described the Vienna specimen as brownish grey. The contradictory colour descriptions I believe are an artifact of aging in museum specimens in which blacks and greys can change to brown, a process hastened if specimens are not kept out of light (see Brothwell 1987). For example, Spiza townsendi , a unique specimen collected by Audubon in the 1830s was originally grey but is now brown (see Fuller 2001). Furthermore, Dubois (1674) and Brisson (1760) described wild and captive birds as dark grey. Another probable erroneous depiction is the bluish-lilac head. No such colour is mentioned in any of the early accounts of live birds in which the head is described as grey (e.g. Brisson 1760). Levaillant (1805) followed by Salvadori (1891), gave the following description of a stuffed individual:

….the rest of the head and the neck is an ashen grey, lightly purplish [or mauvish]; upper back, mantle, wings and all coverts are dull brown, greyish in certain aspect [or appearance] [my translation].

The light purplish head and the greyish colouration are obviously subtle colours, perhaps evident only in certain angles of light. The overall dark colouration can swamp these colours when seen from any distance and this may well account for the confusion. The origin of the purplish and brown bird stems from a painting, the first coloured illustration of Mascarinus , by Martinet (in Buffon 1779: pl.35) ( Fig.17a ). Martinet was employed to illustrate Buffon’s work, and would not have been responsible for all final reproductions. He was head of a workshop employing over 80 artists and workers and was subject to a strict timetable for completing Buffon’s and other works ( Jackson 1999). Furthermore, the original plates were hand-coloured, a standard practice during the 18 th and early 19 th centuries ( Dance 1978) that led to considerable variation. Martinet’s depiction is almost certainly the same stuffed bird described by Buffon, and examination of several copies of his plates of Mascarinus showed marked discrepancies in colouration between them ( Table 2). Despite the best efforts of the artists, depicting subtle colours using water-based paints is extremely difficult and in the renditions of Mascarinus the purples and browns appear much too strong. It is not surprising, therefore, that so many inconsistencies exist.

Martinet’s plate also has one feature that links it to the majority of the subsequent illustrations of Mascarinus : the absence of two dark central tail feathers without white bases as described by Brisson (1760). In Martinet’s illustration, the central tail feathers are shown with a white base which suggests that the specimen (almost certainly the Paris bird) lacked these feathers. This might have arisen from the fact that the Paris specimen was severely damaged during an attempt to fumigate the cases in the 1790s by burning sulphur (Milne- Edwards & Oustalet 1893), which combined with water to produce sulphuric acid, and almost all of the tail and distal wing areas were destroyed ( Fig. 16 ). Unfortunately the Vienna specimen, which has an undamaged tail, cannot be used as a comparison because the tail is almost entirely albinistic (Hume pers.obs.). Martinet (locs.cit.), Martinet (1787), Hahn (1834), Keulemans (in Milne-Edwards & Oustalet, 1893), Keulemans (in Rothschild, 1907b) have all included this feature in their works. This implies that Martinet’s illustration, which was an unreliable source to begin with, provided the basis for all of these renditions of Mascarinus .

Further confusion appears in the account of Forbes (1879), who described Mascarinus as having nostrils entirely covered with feathers. This may not have originally been the case. Brisson (1760) and Wagler (1832 [1835]) clearly stated that the nostrils are exposed and surrounded by red skin. Forbes examined the specimen after Milne-Edwards had removed the skull and presumably when the rampthotheca was reattached to the skin, the nostrils were obliterated. The removal of the skull and jaws also explains the unnatural shape of the head ( Fig. 16 ) in this specimen.

Based on the distinctive large red bill, Garrod (1874), Forbes (1879) and Oustalet (1897) suggested a close relationship among Mascarinus , Tanygnathus and Psittacula . A red bill is a diagnostic feature of the tribe Psittaculini ( Forshaw 1989, Collar 1997, Juniper and Parr 1998). Although Mascarinus possessed a bright red bill, it exhibited atypical plumage patterns, including a moderately long tail with white bases to the dorsal surface of the outer tail feathers, and a thick, black, velvety facemask ( Fig. 17a & 17b ). Black facial feathering occurs widely within the Psittaculini , however, and may range from moderate, e.g. Tanygnathus gramineus , to extensive, e.g. Psittacula derbianus and P. caniceps .

An enigmatic specimen, mentioned here for completeness, was housed in the Cabinet du Roi. It was noted by Buffon (1779: 132) in his description of Mascarinus :

We have an individual in the King’s Cabinet of the same size and of the same colour [as Mascarinus ], except that it has not got a black mask, nor the white on the tail, and that all its body is equally brown; the beak is also smaller, and it that respect, it resembles a vaza [ Coracopsis ], of which it would appear to be a variety, if it does not form an intermediate species between that bird and the Mascarine. To the same species or variety, we would refer the brown parrot of Brisson [my translation].

Although it is now impossible to determine what species is being discussed here, it is clearly not a misidentified vaza Coracopsis vasa or Mascarinus . Of the 2 species of Coracopsis , the larger, C. vasa , is 50 cm in total length, much larger than Mascarinus , whereas C. nigra , at 35 cm, is roughly equal in size. Thus this specimen may have been C. nigra or an aged specimen of the now long extinct Réunion Grey parrot Psittacula cf. bensoni and, as with Mascarinus , the greys had changed to browns. Unfortunately, the whereabouts of this specimen are now unknown.

Figures

FIGURE 16. Mascarinus mascarinus MNHN 211 u/s. Note the damaged tail destroyed by sulphuric acid.

FIGURE 17a. Mascarinus mascarinus (Martinet’s illustration in Buffon, 1779); 17b. M. mascarinus (Hahn, 1834).