Hunter Island penguin

Tasidyptes hunteri Temporal range: Holocene PreЄ Є O S D C P T J K Pg N ↓
Conservation status
Fossil
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Aves
Order:	Sphenisciformes
Family:	Spheniscidae
Genus:	Tasidyptes Van Tets & O’Connor, 1983
Species:	T. hunteri
Binomial name
Tasidyptes hunteri Van Tets & O’Connor, 1983

The Hunter Island penguin (Tasidyptes hunteri) is an extinct penguin, subfossil remains of which were found in a Holocene Aboriginal midden at Stockyard Site on Hunter Island, in Bass Strait 5 km off the western end of the north coast of Tasmania, Australia.^[1] The remains were estimated by radiocarbon dating to be about 760 ± 70 years old. The validity of the taxon has subsequently been questioned because of the fragmentary nature of the fossils, the lack of distinguishability of some of them from Eudyptes, and their origin in different stratigraphic layers of the midden.^[2]

References

1. Tets, GF van & O'Connor, S (1983). "The Hunter Island Penguin; An Extinct New Genus and Species from a Tasmanian Midden". Records of the Queen Victoria Museum 81: 1–13.
2. Park, Travis & Fitzgerald, Erich MD (2012). "A Review of Australian Fossil Penguins (Aves: Sphenisciformes)" (PDF). Memoirs of Museum Victoria 69: 309–325.