Archaeospheniscus lowei

Taxobox
name = Lowe's Penguin
status = fossil
fossil_range = Late Oligocene
regnum = Animalia
phylum = Chordata
subphylum = Vertebrata
classis = Aves
ordo = Sphenisciformes
familia = Spheniscidae
genus = "Archaeospheniscus"
species = "A. lowei"
binomial = "Archaeospheniscus lowei"
binomial_authority = Marples, 1952

Lowe's Penguin ("Archaeospheniscus lowei") is the type species of the extinct penguin genus "Archaeospheniscus". It stood approximately 85-115 cm high, between a modern King Penguin and an Emperor Penguin in size. It is known from bones of a single individual (Otago Museum C.47.20) and possibly some additional material such as the OM C.47.27 femur, all recovered from the Late Oligocene Kokoamu Greensand Formation (27-28 MYA) at Duntroon, New Zealand.

The species' binomen was given in honor of Percy Lowe, who researched prehistoric penguins and proposed a theory (now considered erroneous) that these birds were derived from reptiles independently of the other modern birds.

References

* Marples, Brian J. (1952): Early Tertiary penguins of New Zealand. "New Zealand Geol. Surv., Paleont. Bull." 20: 1-66.
* Simpson, George Gaylord (1971): A review of the pre-Pleistocene penguins of New Zealand. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 144: 319–378. [http://digitallibrary.amnh.org/dspace/bitstream/2246/1086/1/B144a05.pdf PDF fulltext]