American Ornithological Society's recent post about the 67th supplement originally stated that Guatemala was gaining it's first endemic species, the Guatemalan Motmot. They've since published the following correction:
Correction: October 23, 2026: In our earlier version, Momotus castaneiceps (Guatemalan Motmot) was incorrectly listed as Guatemala’s first endemic species. Podilymbus gigas (Atitlán Grebe) is an extinct, flightless water bird that was endemic to Lago de Atitlán in Guatemala, and was declared extinct in 1990. This post has been updated to correct this fact; we regret the error.
So what was the Atitlán Grebe?
The Atitlán Grebe lived exclusively in Lake Atitlán. For this heavy, dense, short-winged relative of the Pied-billed grebe, flight was "highly improbable, if not impossible" and was considered "practically flightless". It was first described in 1925 and declared extinct less than 100 years later in 1990. At its peak, the population may have gotten up to 400 birds but was likely limited to 200-300 birds. The introduction of Largemouth Bass into the lake is believed to have started the grebes' decline as they both struggled to compete with the bass for food and were potentially predated upon by the bass. The decline and struggles of the species were well-documented in real time over the course of a few decades by ecologist Anne LaBastille.
In 1960, researchers counted roughly 200 birds. Five years later, merely 80. LaBastille published several reports on the species with assistance from organizations like BirdLife International, the Smithsonian Institution, World Wildlife Fund, National Wildlife Federation, and more. Eventually she was able to collaborate with the Guatemalan Ministry of Agriculture to launch Operation Protection of the Poc (Poc being the local name for the Atitlán Grebe). They hired one year-round game warden and a few volunteer wardens to prevent poaching of the grebes and over-harvesting of the reeds where they nest. The Ministry created a national refuge for Atitlán Grebes on the site of an old fish hatchery, intending to keep a few breeding pairs there under the watchful eye of a live-in guardian. The president made a national decree to protect the grebes. Educators traveled throughout the lake's watershed talk about the Atitlán Grebe and the importance of conservation. LaBastille caught 2 males and 2 females for the refuge with advice on capture from the Bronx Zoo and other researchers, but these birds escaped. Despite this setback, the population steadily recovered to over 200 birds by 1973. This was considered a great success, especially as the carrying capacity of the lake at the time was estimated by LaBastille to be 280 birds at most.
If the story ended there, the Atitlán Grebe would be an inspiring story of conservation success. Further documented by Bastille, in the 70s and 80s, an earthquake caused severe damage to the beds of reeds that the grebes need for nesting, political unrest in the country led to a rise in poaching, and Bastille's friend and grebe warden Edgar Bauer was murdered. The population began to decline again and in 1990 was declared extinct.
LaBastille, A. (1974). Ecology and Management of the Atitlán Grebe, Lake Atitlán, Guatemala. Wildlife Monographs, (37), 3–66. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3830373
Llimona, F., J. del Hoyo, D. A. Christie, F. Jutglar, and G. M. Kirwan (2020). Atitlan Grebe (Podilymbus gigas), version 1.0. In Birds of the World (J. del Hoyo, A. Elliott, J. Sargatal, D. A. Christie, and E. de Juana, Editors). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA. https://doi.org/10.2173/bow.atigre1.01
I read one of LaBastille's articles that I could get access to and I read the Birds of the World section on the Atitlán Grebe but I feel like I should point out that Birds of the World only has 4 references and they're all LaBastille's work. So it's all LaBastille all the way down as far as English sources go. I wanted to look more into the Guatemalan side of things as it seems like they took a very active approach but I only had around an hour for this and I don't know enough Spanish for primary sources sadly.
