WELLINGTON, New Zealand —

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Researchers studying a rare and endangered species of penguin receive uncovered a previously unknown species that disappeared about 500 years agone.

The scrutiny suggests that the first humans in New Zealand hunted the newly found Waitaha penguin to extinction by 1500, about 250 years hind their arrival on the islands. But the loss of the Waitaha allowed another kind of penguin to thrive - the green-eyed species that now also faces extinction, Philip Seddon of Otago University, a co-author of the study, said Wednesday.

The team was testing DNA from the bones of prehistoric modern yellow-eyed penguins during the term of genetic changes associated with human settlement when it found some bones that were older - and had different DNA.

Tests steady the older bones “lead us to describe a new penguin species that became extinct only a few century years ago,” the team reported in a paper in the biological research journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.

Polynesian settlers came to New Zealand around 1250 and are known to consider hunted species such for the reason that the bulky, flightless moa bird to extinction.

Seddon said dating techniques used without ceasing bones pulled from old Maori worthless stuff pits revealed a gap in time between the disappearance of the Waitaha and the arrival of the yellow-eyed penguin.

The gap indicates the extermination of the older bird created the opportunity for the newer to colonize New Zealand’s strength islands around 500 years ago, said Sanne Boessenkool, an Otago University doctoral student who led the team of researchers, including some from Australia’s Adelaide University and New Zealand’s Canterbury Museum.

Competition between the two penguin species may have previously prevented the yellow-eyed penguin from expanding north, the researchers noted.

David Penny of New Zealand’s Massey University, who was not involved in the research, said the Waitaha was some example of one more native species that was unable to adapt to a human presence.

“In addition, it is vitally important to know how form, such as the jealous penguin, are able to reply to new opportunities,” he said. “It is becoming apparent that some figure can rejoin to things like climate change, and others cannot. The added we know, the in greater numbers we can help.”

The green-eyed penguin is considered one of the world’s rarest. An estimated peopling of 7,000 in New Zealand is the converging-point of an extensive maintenance effort.

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