Three recently extinct species on display at the Harvard Museum of Natural History: the South Island giant moa (Dinornis robustus), Steller’s sea cow (Hydrodamalis gigas), and thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus).
The South Island giant moa was a species of moa (order Dinornithoformes) that, like the rest of its order, was endemic to New Zealand. It was the largest of the moa species, with females reaching 6.6 feet at the back and weighing up to 510 lbs. It was found exclusively on Te Waipounamu, the South Island of New Zealand. Like the rest of the moa it went extinct around 1300-1440 CE primarily due to hunting by the Maori, who had arrived in New Zealand around 1280 CE. The closest living relatives of the moa are the tinamous, small birds native to Central and South America.
The Steller’s sea cow was a large sirenian found in the Bering Sea, between Russia and Alaska. Though it was only discovered by Europeans in 1741 it was likely known to other peoples prior to then. The species was aggressively hunted for it’s blubber, and within 27 years of being discovered by Europeans it was extinct. The closest living relative to the Steller’s sea cow is the dugong, a smaller sirenian found in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.
Finally, the thylacine is among the most famous recently extinct animals. The species had once ranged across mainland Australia and New Guinea, but it had already likely become extinct in these places prior to European contact. Through the process of convergent evolution it developed many similarities to canids, occupying a similar ecological niche to them. The exact reason why thylacines became extinct on the mainland is unknown, though it may have been a combination of factors including human activity and the introduction of the dingo around 3,450 years ago. The last known animal, Benjamin, died in 1936 at the London Zoo. By that time the species had become extremely rare or extinct on Tasmania due to decades of aggressive hunting. Some still believe that thylacines exist, however this is considered very unlikely by scientists. The closest living relative is the endangered Tasmanian devil.
