Brown mesite Brown mesite The brown mesite ("Mesitornis unicolor") is a ground-dwelling bird endemic to Madagascar. It is one of three species in the mesite family or the Mesitornithidae, and though classified as vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), it is the most widespread of the three. This species is a medium-sized terrestrial bird which is often described as rail-like (a family with which the mesites are sometimes placed). The species has a plain face, marked only by a slightly contrasting fleshy eye-ring around a rather large eye and a variable white streak behind the eye. It has
Australia (continent) is most often used for a wider region that includes lands like New Zealand that are not on the same continental shelf. In the early 1970s, the term "Greater Australia" was introduced for the Pleistocene continent. Then at a 1975 conference and consequent publication, the name "Sahul" was extended from its previous use for just the Sahul Shelf to cover the continent. In 1984 W. Filewood suggested the name "Meganesia", meaning "great island" or "great island-group", for both the Pleistocene continent and the present-day lands, and this name has been widely accepted by biologists. Others have used "Meganesia" with different