With its unmistakable fiery red plumage, which was used to decorate the robes worn by Hawaiian royalty in ancient times, the Iiwi Depranis coccinea (pronounced ee-EE-vee), or Scarlet Honeycreeper, is tightly entwined with Hawaiian folklore. Endemic to the islands, it was once abundant in forests through-out the archipelago, but now finds itself largely restricted to high-elevation forests on the islands of Hawaii, Maui and Kauai, where temperatures are too low for regular disease transmission. While a few populations remain stable, the species was uplisted to Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List in 2008.
Source: BirdLife, 15 Feb 2017
http://www.birdlife.org/americas/news/one-watch-iiwi-decline
Iiwi on the decline
