Lord Howe boobook Lord Howe boobook The Lord Howe boobook ("Ninox novaeseelandiae albaria"), also known as the Lord Howe morepork, was a bird in the true owl family endemic to Lord Howe Island in the Tasman Sea, part of New South Wales, Australia. It is an extinct and little-known subspecies of the Southern boobook ("Ninox novaeseelandiae"). The Lord Howe boobook was similar in appearance to other subspecies of the Southern boobook, being a small brown hawk owl with white-mottled plumage, paler than other subspecies. Measurements taken from museum specimens indicate that it was smaller than most mainland Australian subspecies of boobook but larger
Southern boobook to "N. connivens". Genetic and call analysis show the Christmas boobook ("N. natalis") to be very close to the Australian populations of the southern boobook, leading Gwee and colleagues to suggest it be reclassified within this species. Gwee and colleagues found that boobook populations on larger mountainous islands were more distinct from Australian stock, while those on flatter smaller islands were much more similar, suggesting that these locations were colonised much more recently after previous populations had become extinct. Eleven subspecies of "Ninox boobook" are recognised in version 7.3 of the IOC World Bird List, published in July 2017: The