the Moorea Sandpiper. Three specimens mentioned by John Latham in 1787 all differed from one another, but the single remaining one, RMNH 87556, cannot be positively identified with any of them. How it came into the possession of the museum cannot be retraced with complete certainty, but it probably was acquired in 1819 with other specimens from Georg Forster. There also exists a painting by Forster, drawn from the original specimen. At any rate, the specimen agrees better with the Tahiti bird in Forster's painting. The Moorea Sandpiper—of which another painting, by William Ellis, and a plate by John Webber, supposed to depict the other specimen, constitute all remaining evidence—differs in the color of wings and head. Whether these two forms were species, subspecies, or simply variants due to age or sex cannot be determined with certainty, but for the present they are more often treated as different species than not. The Tahiti and Moorea Sandpipers are believed to have occurred near small streams. Bones of a related form have been found on Mangaia in the Cook Islands. It is not likely that they will be studied anytime soon; a scientific description would require either successful extraction and analysis of DNA from both the bones and the Leiden specimen (which would risk being damaged during extraction of the tissue sample), or the collection of a sufficient amount of material from Tahiti or Moorea to determine the Mangaia bird's affiliation by analysis of the osteology. References Further reading Greenway, James C. (1967): Tahitian Sandpiper. In: Extinct and Vanishing Birds of the World (2nd ed.): 263–264. Dover Publications, New York. Hayman, Peter; Marchant, John & Prater, Tony (1986): Shorebirds: an identification guide to the waders of the world. Houghton Mifflin, Boston. Latham, John (1824): [White-winged Sandpiper]: In: A general history of birds 9: 296. External links BirdLife species factsheet. Prosobonia Bird extinctions since 1500 Birds described in 1789 Taxa named by Johann Friedrich Gmelin † Extinct birds of Oceania Articles containing video clips