 The combination of habitat destruction and the introduction of feral cats and rats are thought to have led to the Lānai hookbill's extinction.The Lānai hookbill was first collected by George C. Munro from Lānai's Kaiholena Valley on February 22, 1913.In 1919 Robert Cyril Layton Perkins described the species as "Dysmorodrepanis munroi" based upon this specimen, placing the hookbill in a new, monotypic genus.