A new species of extinct megapode, a ground-dwelling relative of chickens that may have weighed several times more than its modern counterpart, has been identified from a single foot-bone fragment found in Liang Bua cave on the Indonesian island of Flores. The bird, named Megapodius Roxi, is estimated to have weighed about 3.9 kilograms and lived between approximately 190,000 and 120,000 years ago.
A giant megapode from Flores
Megapodes, also known as mound-builders, are medium-sized to large terrestrial birds with powerful legs and sharp claws. Unlike most birds, they use heat from the environment rather than their own bodies to incubate their eggs, burying them in soil, vegetation or other warm material.
“Megapodes are a group of birds that use environmental heat rather than body heat to bury and hatch their eggs,” said paleontologist Haneke Mayer of the Bergen University Museum and colleagues.
“They are almost entirely confined to areas east of the Wallace Line in the Philippines, eastern Indonesia, Melanesia and Australia. Interestingly, megapodes do not occur in mainland Southeast Asia or the Greater Sunda Islands.”
The only megapode currently living on Flores is the Orange Ashimegapode (Megapodius Reinwald), which weighs between 0.5 and 1.2 kilograms. The newly identified species was therefore considerably larger than the island’s living megapode.
The researchers said this unusual distribution may reflect several factors, including the historical movement or introduction of organisms, the presence of mammalian predators on western islands and competition between megapodes and pheasants in mainland Asia and the Greater Sunda Islands.
A single fossil bone
The fossil is the lower half of a right tarsometatarsal, a bone in the lower leg and foot. It was excavated in 2009 from Liang Bua, the cave where the remains of the small hominin Homo floresiensis were discovered.
The bone came from deposits approximately 190,000 to 120,000 years old. It is larger than the corresponding bone in any known living or extinct species of Megapodius, making it the first fossil evidence of a giant megapode found in Wallacea, the island region between mainland Asia and Australia.
“The species name pays homage to Indonesian zooarchaeologist Rocus de Ave,” the researchers said. “He played a seminal role in the analysis of animal remains and was the first to pinpoint the hominin bones and teeth that ultimately became part of the lower limb of Homo floresiensis after the discovery of the famous partial skeleton in 2003.”
“Megapodius Roxi is the first species of megapod named after an Indonesian researcher,” they added.
Questions about flight and extinction
Scientists cannot determine whether Megapodius Roxi could fly because no shoulder or wing bones were recovered. It is also unknown when the species became extinct or whether it coexisted with the smaller megapode species still found on Flores.
The researchers suggest that modern megapodes may have arrived on the island only after the larger birds had disappeared.
Megapode eggs are potentially an important food source because the yolk accounts for approximately 50% to 60% of the egg’s weight and is considered highly nutritious. However, the birds’ distinctive mounds and communal burrows can also make their eggs and chicks vulnerable to predators.
“Their eggs would have been an available source of nutrition for both Homo floresiensis and modern humans living 50,000 years ago and later,” the authors said.
The study was published online on October 22, 2026, in Alcheringa: An Australasian Journal of Palaeontology.
Reference
Haneke J.M. Meyer et al. “A new species of megapode (Galliformes: Megapodidae) that lived during the Pleistocene in Liang Bua, Flores Island.” Alcheringa, published online October 22, 2026. doi: 10.1080/03115518.2026.2741158.
Source: www.sci.news
