Tahiti rail plantations. Its diet appears to have consisted mainly of insects and occasionally copra (coconut meat). The extinction of the Tahiti rail was probably due to predation by humans and introduced cats and rats. It appears to have become extinct some time after 1844 on Tahiti, and perhaps as late as the 1930s on Mehetia. The Tahiti rail was found on the South Pacific island of Tahiti (part of the Society Islands archipelago) by naturalists who were part of the British explorer James Cook's second voyage around the world (1772–1775). The bird was illustrated by Georg Forster, who accompanied his father,
1769 Transit of Venus observed from Tahiti was so sharp that it was taken from the official proceedings of the Society. Green was not given the opportunity to personally present his own data nor could he defend himself. Halley's 1716 article called for observers to witness the transit at various places on the globe. The response from the scientific community was astounding. There were at least 120 observers at sixty-two individual posts for the 1761 transit. Observations took place not only in Europe, but also included Calcutta, Tobolsk, Siberia, the Cape of Good Hope, and St. John's in Newfoundland. The 1769 viewing also proved to be a