Seminar Series 2005

Avian disease in the Pacific: Hawaii's present, French Polynesia's future?

Jon Beadell
Smithsonian Institution

Avian malaria has been implicated in the decline of Hawaii's forest birds. Although the disease has been well-studied in Hawaii, little is known about it's origins and classical identification techniques may have obscured our understanding of its true geographical and host distribution outside of Hawaii. Using molecular markers, we have shown that Hawaii's avian malaria represents just one of numerous lineages composing the morphological parasite species. This single lineage exhibits a broad host distribution worldwide and is dominant on several remote oceanic islands. Rarity of this lineage in the New World and the restriction of related lineages to the Old World suggest limitations to the transmission of reproductively-isolated parasite groups within the morphological species. Given the dramatic impact of introduced disease on native Hawaiian birds, future work will focus on identifying avian diseases present in forest birds of French Polynesia and a comparative appraisal of immune function in island bird populations relative to their mainland source.