John C. Mittermeier, Alex J. Berryman & Cullen Hanks / 17 Mar 2025
Now that we are a few months into 2025, it is time to update the Lost Birds list. Doing an annual update keeps the Lost Birds list current with the ten-year timeframe that defines “lost.” For the 2025 version, any bird that has not been documented since January 1, 2015, now meets that definition. Updates also allow the list of Lost Birds to incorporate taxonomic changes (there were a lot of new splits in 2024) and revisions to the conservation status of species made by the IUCN Red List. Finally, an annual review provides an opportunity to summarize which species were rediscovered in the past year.
The first version of the Lost Birds list in 2022 included 135 lost bird species. By the 2024 update (here), there were 126. Where do things stand as we head into 2025?
Birds Found in 2024
Let’s start with the fun part. What birds were rediscovered in 2024? Here are the rediscoveries that we learned about since the last update:
Vilcabamba Inca – photographed and videoed by Carole Turek of Hummingbird Spot in August 2024 as part of Carole’s quest to document every hummingbird species on Earth.
Sira Barbet – photographed by Jasmín Odar with a team from GECO Nature in July 2024 after being lost for 11 years, and then photographed again by Saturnino Llactahuaman in January 2025. See Fabrice Schmitt’s story of the July sighting here.
Slender-tailed Cisticola – photographed by Michael Mills of Go-Away-Birding in February 2024 after being lost 14 years. See our article about it here.
Bougainville Thicketbird – photographed in September 2024 by Josh Bergmark and Julien Mazenauer of Ornis Birding Expeditions after being lost for 22 years. See Josh’s article for the full story.
New Britain Thrush – photographed on a camera trap by Jason Gregg in July 2024 after being lost for 25 years.
Peruvian Solitaire – sound recorded by Fabrice Schmitt and the team from GECO Nature in August 2024 after being lost for 11 years as part of the same expedition that found the Sira Barbet.
Unicolored Thrush – photographed by Tini & Jacob Wijpkema in August 2024 after being lost for 11 years. See Tini and Jacob’s story here.
Black-lored Waxbill – photographed by Manuel Weber in September 2023 after being lost for 73 years! Manuel’s photographs and findings were published in December 2024 in the Bulletin of the African Bird Club. See Nina Foster’s article about the rediscovery here.
Two birds listed in the previous update (New Britain Goshawk and Mussau Triller) were rediscovered in 2024, while the Black-lored Waxbill was photographed in 2023. This means that a total of nine lost birds were documented in 2024. Not bad!
Extinctions
Unfortunately, some lost birds turn out to be extinct. Confirming the extinction of these species is depressing work, but crucial to informing conservation efforts and understanding the risks to bird species around the world.
As the Red List Authority for birds, BirdLife International comprehensively updates the IUCN Red List status of bird species every few years, with a subset being re-assessed each year. This includes determining whether or not species should be declared extinct. The 2024 update to the IUCN Red List includes the first Lost Birds declared extinct since the Search for Lost Birds commenced, with five species from the list moving to the Extinct (EX) category. All of these species were once found on oceanic islands in the Pacific with four of the five honeycreepers endemic to Hawaii, underscoring the incredibly urgent conservation threats that face many Pacific island birds.
White-chested White-eye – endemic to Norfolk Island, Australia, the last documented record was in 1942. Previously considered critically endangered (CR) this species is now extinct (EX).
Ou – a honeycreeper once found on multiple Hawaiian Islands, the last documented record was in 1977. Previously considered critically endangered (possibly extinct) CR(PE) this species is now EX.
Kauai Nukupuu – endemic to the island of Kauai, Hawaii, the last documented record was in 1899. Previously considered CR(PE) this species is now EX.
Maui Nukupuu –endemic to Maui, Hawaii, the last documented record was in 1896. Previously considered CR(PE) this species is now EX.
Maui Akepa – another Maui endemic, the last documented record was in 1901. Previously considered CR(PE) this species is now EX.
Though it has yet to be evaluated by the Red List, a recent study concluded that the Slender-billed Curlew is also extinct. Breaking from the pattern of extinctions on islands, the curlew is the first known extinction of bird species from continental Europe. BirdLife will likely propose to the IUCN that this species be moved to EX in the 2025 Red List update.
Lost Birds that are declared extinct will stay on the Lost Birds list. We are working on adding a new list filter for these species but for now they are marked as “found” to indicate that they are no longer search targets.
Taxonomic Changes and Other Updates
2024 saw a number of significant taxonomic revisions for bird species around the world (a summary of the eBird/Clements Checklist changes can be seen here). Updates leaned heavily towards splitting, meaning more recognized bird species overall, as well as convergence between the eBird/Clements Checklist and the HBW/BirdLife Taxonomic Checklist. For birds already on the Lost Birds list, the 2024 taxonomic updates resulted in two birds that were considered species in only HBW/BirdLife now being recognized as species in both taxonomies: Red-brown Myzomela (whose common name is changed to Biak Myzomela) and White-tailed Tityra. In addition to the myzomela, Sharpe’s Lark also changed its common name and is now Russet Lark.
Meanwhile, one Lost Bird was lumped:
Ash’s Lark is now considered a subspecies of Somali Lark. Similar to Scaly-breasted Kingfisher (Plain-backed) and Katanga Masked Weaver (Upemba), this species stays on the Lost Birds list but is now called Somali Lark (Ash’s). The rarely-recorded northern subspecies of Somali Lark, with which Ash’s was lumped, is also poorly-known but was photographed in April 2024 by Michel Watelet.
In addition to taxonomic updates, one bird gets removed from the list thanks to information that we missed in 2024:
Northern Catbird – this species was photographed in 2020 on Yapen Island, New Guinea, by Brecht Verhelst, a record we missed when we included the catbird in the 2024 update. With records in 2012 and 2020, the catbird was never lost. Thanks to Brecht for pointing out this out and directing us to the 2020 photos!
Similar to Carrizal Seedeater and Jambandu Indigobird in last year’s update, we have removed Northern Catbird from the Lost Birds list.
New Additions to the Lost Birds list
The 2025 update includes 11 new additions to the Lost Birds list (remember these are species for which we could not find any documentation that was more recent than January 1, 2015):
Luzon Rail – A secretive rail species from the Philippines, the most recent records appear to be a series of photographs taken in 2014.
Chestnut-shouldered Goshawk – The New Guinea version of Australia’s elusive Red Goshawk, this species is supposedly widespread in appropriate habitat but incredibly difficult to find. There were excellent photos taken in 2014 but no records we know of since then (and very few before).
Blue-fronted Lorikeet – Endemic to the island of Buru, Indonesia, this small lorikeet was lost for nearly a century, rediscovered with photos in 2014, and has not been recorded again since. In 2024, this bird was moved from critically endangered to data deficient on the IUCN Red List.
Paria Barbtail – Endemic to the Paria Peninsula in northern Venezuela, there have been a few recent observations of this Endangered species but the last documented record appears to be a sound recording from 2014.
Broad-billed Fairywren – A poorly-known forest bird from northern New Guinea, there are a number of recent records of this species but the most recent documented observations appear to be photographs taken in 2014.
Sulu Cuckooshrike – A 2024 split from Bar-bellied Cuckooshrike in the eBird taxonomy, this cuckooshrike is endemic to the Sulu Archipelago, Philippines. The last documented records appear to be video recordings from 2008.
Ogea Monarch – Known from the tiny, remote islands of Ogea in Fiji this monarch is apparently relatively common in its range but Ogea is so infrequently visited by birders that the last documented records were in 2014.
Rusty Lark – A mysterious lark found in arid savannas of Niger, Chad, and Sudan. A supposed photograph from 2017, that kept this species off previous iterations of the Lost Birds list, turned out to be misidentified, pushing the last documented record of Rusty Lark back to 1931! Thanks to Stratton Hatfield for helping to review the recent records of this rare lark.
Bismarck Island-Thrush – one of 2024’s most notable taxonomic updates was the split of Island Thrush into 17 different species in the eBird taxonomy. Many of these newly-recognized thrushes are seldom recorded, but only one turns out to be lost: Bismarck Island-Thrush. Found in the Bismarck Archipelago, Papua New Guinea, the last documented record of this thrush were on New Ireland in 1994.
Sulu Jungle Flycatcher – As with the Sulu Cuckooshrike, this 2024 split (from Chestnut-tailed Jungle Flycatcher) resulted in a newly-lost species endemic to the Sulu Archipelago. This means that there are now three lost birds on these islands (Sulu Bleeding-heart being the third). There have been recent records of the flycatcher, but the last documentation appears to be a series of sound recordings from 1998.
Red Weaver – Found in dry habitats of southern Somalia and northern Kenya the most recent documentation of this beautiful weaver is a photograph from 2014, which may be only photograph ever taken of the species.
Taxonomic changes are responsible for three of these new additions to the Lost Birds list: Sulu Cuckooshrike, Bismarck Island-Thrush, and Sulu Jungle Flycatcher were not considered species prior to 2024. (Perhaps more surprising is that the large number of recent splits only resulted in three newly lost birds!) Meanwhile, improved data revealed Rusty Lark to be a long-lost species. The remaining seven species were all last documented in 2014.
How many lost birds are there now?
Rediscoveries, extinctions, taxonomic changes, new additions, this is can hard to keep track of. How many lost birds are there now?
After the 2024 update there were 126 lost species. Since then, there have eight rediscoveries, five extinctions, and two species removed because of a taxonomic change and a missed record. Add the eleven new additions to the lost birds list and the current total is 122 Lost Bird species.
To put this in perspective, there were 135 lost birds in 2022, 126 in 2024, and now 122.
Next to be rediscovered?
The process of updating the Lost Birds list revealed a number of species that came tantalizingly close to being rediscovered in 2024. A Ghana Cuckooshrike was seen in April in Cote d’Ivoire, Rufous Monarchs were reported at several locations in New Guinea, probable Archbold’s Owlet-nightjars were heard in the New Guinea mountains, and a Bougainville Thrush was likely heard in the mountains of Bougainville (see Josh Bergmark’s description here). Could these be the next birds to be rediscovered?
Thanks to the many people who entered bird photos, sound recordings and other records around the world this past year, as well as Bruce Beehler, Rob Hutchinson, Marshal Iliff, David Ascanio, Stratton Hatfield, Guy Dutson, Josh Bergmark, Mark O’Brien, Jhonathan Miranda, and James Eaton for generously helping with queries about specific species.