Elephant bird to carry off large primates; today, lemurs still retain a fear of aerial predators such as these. Another might be the perception of ratites retaining neotenic features and thus being mistaken for enormous chicks of a presumably more massive bird. The ancient Malagasy name for the bird is vorompatra, meaning "bird of the Ampatres". The Ampatres are today known as the Androy region of southern Madagascar. Like the ostrich, rhea, cassowary, emu, kiwi and extinct moa, "Mullerornis" and "Aepyornis" were ratites; they could not fly, and their breast bones had no keel. Because Madagascar and Africa separated before the ratite
Morfil Island the island, but are now locally extinct. The French colonists would use the island for elephant hunting. The main towns on the island are Podor and Salde. Morfil Island Morfil Island (; lit. "Ivory Island") is an island lying between the River Senegal and the Doué River in northern Senegal. "Morfil" is an antiquated French term for raw ivory. It is separate from the mainland for almost 150 km. Around the 11th century, Morfil was the centre of Tekrur, one of the first Islamic Sub-Saharan states. As such, it was an important centre of trans-Saharan trade. The island later became