Maui Nui finch
species of bird
The Maui Nui finch (Telespiza ypsilon) is an extinct member of the genus Telespiza in the family Fringillidae. It was endemic to the Hawaiian islands of Molokai and Maui. It is only known from fossil remains and likely became extinct before the first Europeans visited Hawaii in 1778.
Extinction
Due to its early extinction, very little is known about this species. It is only known from a few bones found in caves. It appears that this species began to go extinct when the first Polynesians settlers came to the islands. They cleared some of the land for farming and introduced species for which the native birds had no defence. According to fossil records, their numbers declined rapidly in the early 12th century. It has been speculated that this species' visits to lower elevations was its undoing due to contact with avian diseases and pests. Today, only about sixty percent of Hawaii has not been drastically altered.
The public source identifies “Maui Nui finch” as species of bird. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Maui, finch and species.
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Datasets, specimens, observations and peer-reviewed methods provide the appropriate test for the technical claims summarized here. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 13, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q2401985. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1778.
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This entry incorporates text from “Maui Nui finch” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.