Meliphagidae (Honeyeaters)

Abstract

The honeyeaters (Meliphagidae) comprise one of the most characteristic, numerous, speciose and widespread components of the Australo-Papuan bird fauna. Although centred in Australia and New Guinea, the group has outliers westwards to the Moluccas and Bali, north to the Northern Mariana Islands and Micronesia, and east through New Zealand and the south-western Pacific to Samoa and Tahiti. Two recently extinct genera, 'Moho' and 'Chaetoptila', once thought to have been honeyeaters but apparently unrelated to the Meliphagidae, occurred in the Hawaiian Islands. Excluding the Hawaiian species, there are at least 42 genera and 175 species in the family as currently constituted.