The snipe-rail (Capellirallus karamu) is an extinct flightless rail endemic to the North Island of New Zealand. The species' name is derived from the Karamu Cave[1] 21km (13miles) from Hamilton[1] where the holotype was discovered in 1954.[1]
The snipe-rail was a relatively small rail[2] which had a bill of about 7 cm, very long in proportion to its body size.[2] Its weight was about 240 g.[2] The type material consists of an incomplete skeleton, including vertebrae, a pelvis, and a hind limb.[1] Since the discovery of these remains, many complete skeletons[1] consisting of hundreds of bones[2] have been unearthed on different sites in the North Island.[2] Its evolutionary relationships to other rail species are unclear [2] but the structure of its bones suggests that it might have been a relative of the likewise extinct Chatham rail.[1] [2] Relative to its body size, the snipe-rail had the smallest wings of all known rail species.[1] [2] It also had a disproportionately large tarsometatarsus.[2]
The bone findings were in the western areas of the North Island[2] where wetter, closed-canopy rainforests prevailed.[2] The bird's long bill suggests that it was able to forage by probing in a similar manner to kiwi.[2]
The exact date of the snipe-rail's extinction is unknown, but it is supposed that the decline began in the 13th century,[2] when the Kiori/Polynesian rat became widespread in New Zealand.[2] [3]