BIRD TAXONOMY OVER THE
LAST 90 YEARS
Taxonomic evolution
After
what had seemed like a lengthy free-for-all over bird classification and the order in which
species should be presented in books and lists, things had begun to settle down
somewhat in the 1890s with the detailed researches of Max Fürbringer in Germany
and German-born Hans Gadow in Cambridge, England. Gadow’s system was based on
an analysis of about 40 largely anatomical characters and his classification
started with the Ostrich Struthio camelus, and finished with the
passeriformes, about which he had comparatively little to say. The Gadow
system, and the passeriform classification constructed by Sharpe (1899–1909)
laid the foundations for many later revisions and versions.
By
the nineteenth century British Henry Seebohm (1881) listed the thrushes as the
most highly developed among the birds on account of their singing qualities and
the development of the plantar tendons. British Alfred Newton (1893, a founding
member of the British Ornithologists’ Union) disagreed, and later arrangers
from the Norway-born American ornithologist Leonhard Stejneger to the German
Erwin Stresemann have listed the crows and their allies as the highest group of
the Oscines.
In
1930, Alexander Wetmore, working at the Smithsonian
Institution in Washington, DC, published the first of five editions of a
classification based heavily on that of Gadow as successively modified. This
was adopted by the AOU (American Ornithologists' Union) for their checklists
and became widely used throughout the world (even in 1969 in East Germany).
Wetmore’s sequence in 1930 started with the non-passerines and ended with the
finches and buntings.
Fifty
years ago, the Fringillidae were regarded as the most recently evolved birds
25~30 million years ago (Oligocene), when seed-bearing plants suddenly came
into prominence. The disconnected families Emberizidae (OLD
WORLD BUNTINGS)
and Passerellidae (NEW WORLD SPARROWS) evolved hereafter, with later New World
Cardinalidae (CARDINALS, GROSBEAKS) and Thraupidae (TANAGERS) spin offs.
Peters Check-list of Birds of the World (1931 to 1987)
James
Lee Peters (a friend of Wetmore) was the initiator of the monumental
work Check-list of Birds of the World, which was published at Harvard
University, Cambridge, MA, in 16 volumes during the over-fifty years period
from 1931 to 1987 (most Passerines in the continuation from 1960 by the later
(mostly) U.S. authors E. Mayr, H.G. Deignan, A.L. Rand (Canadian), J. Delacour
(French-born), J.C. Greenway, R.A. Paynter, C. Vaurie (French-born), J. Davis
& A.H. Miller, S.D. Ripley, R. Schodde (Australian), D.W. Snow (British),
F. Salomonsen (Danish), R.E. Moreau (British), R.W. Storer, G.H. Lowery, E.R.
Blake, M.A. Traylor, S. Amadon), and has been highly influential in ornithology
(and used as a basis for practically all modern check-lists). The order of
families now chosen ends with birds-of-paradise and corvids and was following Mayr and Greenway (1956) in what has become known as
the Basel sequence, agreed by a European
sub-committee for use by European editors. The Peters’ list was the first to
introduce subspecies, and was adopted in 1971 by the BOU, but BOU reverted to
its 1952 (Wetmore order) Check-list after the local bird recorders expressed
their desire for stability.
With
the Peters Checklist far from complete in the 1960s, ornithologists were
itching to compile their own, which lead in 1974 to the Birds of the
World Checklist by James F. Clements, A Coded List of Birds of the
World (typed) by Ernest P. Edwards (1974, Sweet Briar, VA), An annotated
list of the birds of the world (typed) by Mr. Joseph G. Griffith and Mr.
Michael A. Cunningham (1974, Monrovia, CA), and the Checklist of The World’s
Birds by Edward S. Gruson (1976, New York, NY). In Brighton, Sussex, United
Kingdom, D. T. Holyoak did a try with presenting A hand-list of the bird
species of the world (1975), but only the Order Anseriformes was published,
intended to seek the advice of specialists. In this pre-digital era, the last
two publications showed alphabetical listing of species within genera, and the
British issue of genera within families as well.
List of Recent Holarctic Bird Species (1973, 1977, reprints in 1980 and
1991)
Karel
Hendrik Voous (Amsterdam) published his list of
recent holarctic bird species from 1973 to 1977 at Rothshild's private Natural
History Museum in Tring, Hertfordshire. It was based on the Wetmore order but
incorporated many of the more recent research results, and was thus not too
unfamiliar. It was adopted by the nine-volume The Birds of the Western
Palearctic ornithological handbook, and from 1978 by the BOU (British Ornithologists'
Union). The list has been reprinted twice, in 1980 and 1991. The rapid and
widespread acceptance of Voous’s work assured the continuation of a period of
taxonomic stability in Europe that lasted into the 1990s. Voous’ list was also
used for the Handbook of the birds of Western Palaearctic (Cramp and Perrins,
1994).
Earlier,
the BOU had followed Ernst Hartert, a German
ornithologist, who worked in Tring, and had devised his own system based on
Gadow and Sharpe, but starting with the passerines.
Even
in the 2000 Sri Lanka photographic guide (new Holland publisher), the standard
sequence of Orders and Families by Voous is still maintained, as it was at the
Association of European Rarities Committees (AERC), published in 2003 and
finally updated in July 2015.
Reference list of the birds of the world (1975)
The
1975 edition of the Reference list of the birds of the world by J.J.
Morony Jr., W.J. Bock & J. Farrand Jr., compiled to inventory the
anatomical collection of the American Museum of Natural History, at a time that
Peters’ Check-list was not completely published, and without mention of English
names, geographic ranges and subspecies. Peters’ Check-list (volume 1 to 15)
was the basic reference. Ernst Mayr made a partly completed manuscript copy
available for volumes 8 and 11 that were yet unpublished.
This
(typed) Reference list of the birds of the world (“widely used” in 1981) has
also been adopted for some BOU’s non-European check lists. In North America,
where the Birds of the World Checklist by James F. Clements (a
well-traveled amateur birder) was available since 1974, primarily intended for
the birding community, and initially not recommended by the professional
ornithologists, who then apparently decided to compile the above mentioned
Reference list with help from James C. Greenway Jr. and Dean Amadon, as well as
David W. Snow and Melvin A. Traylor, Jr.
Howard and Moore Complete Checklist of the Birds of the World
(1980~1994)
Richard
Howard (non-Passerines) & Alick Moore (Passerines), themselves seemingly
not professional ornithologists either, released their Oxford University Howard
and Moore check list Complete Checklist of the Birds of the World in
1980 (started in 1972) for the use of both amateur and professional
ornithologists (the first complete list to include subspecies), largely based
on Peters’ list (also following order of families by Ernst Mayr), but
with the non-Passerines published by Peters in the 1930s, the Herons are mainly
based on later publications by J. Hancock & H. Elliott (British) and W.J.
Bock, as well as the Storks (by M.P. Kahl), Waterfowl (by P.A. Johnsgard and J.
Delacour), Eagles, Hawks and Falcons (by L. Brown & D. Amadon), Curassows
(by J. Delacour & D. Amadon), Grouse (by P.A. Johnsgard), Pheasants (by J.
Delacour), Rails (by S.D. Ripley), Plovers (by W.J. Bock), Sandpipers (by J.R.
Jehl), Gulls, Skuas and Auks (by W.B. Alexander), Pigeons and Doves (by D.
Goodwin, British), Parrots (by J.M. Forshaw, Australian), Toucans (by J.
Haffer, German) and Ovenbirds (by C. Vaurie). K.H. Voous’ publications were,
among many others, used for Grebes, Petrels and Shearwaters, Buntings and
Finches. C.G. Sibley’s early work contributed to Flamingos, Thrushes, Monarchs,
and Wood Warblers.
Peters’
Check-list was not used at all for Turacos (R.E. Moreau), Swifts (British R.K.
Brooke, C.M. N. White, American R. Meyer de Schauensee), Bee-eaters (British C.
Fry), Cotingas and Manakins (D.W. Snow), Tyrant-Flycatchers (C.B. Cory,
Austrian C.E. Hellmayr and R. Meyer de Schauensee), New Zealand Wrens
(O.S.N.Z.), Asities (A.L. Rand, Canadian), Lyrebirds and Scrubbirds (R. Schodde,
Australian), Hawaiian Honeycreepers (G.C. Munro, New Zealand born American),
Birds of Paradise and Bowerbirds (American W.J. Cooper & J.M. Forshaw,
Australian), Crows (D. Goodwin, British).
The
Reference list of the birds of the world by J.J. Morony was quoted for the
Woodpeckers, Pittas, Monarchs, as well as Old World Warblers and Flycatchers
(also quotations by C. Vaurie) and Australasian Wrens (also quotations by R.
Schodde).
Over
70 non-Passerine families have been quoted mainly from Peters’ work, and over
40 Passerine families from his work and the later authors. This Howard and
Moore check list soon became the most popular in English in Europe, as a world
check list.
In
the 1990/1991 second edition of the Howard and Moore check list (actually the
third edition since 1980 after a 1984 upgrade), the species count came in at
just over 9200 (vs 8500 in 1980) due to changes in the recognition of species
limits, i.e. upgrading/splitting subspecies into full species, while just 34
new species were described. This is in contrast with what was common usage
until the 1970s when ”lumping” of species reduced them to subspecies.
But
a 1994 reprint included an appendix with a further 282 changes, among which 150
splits/upgrades, 30 lumps and 50 scientifical name changes (36 genus and 14
specific name) and 21 newly discovered (of which 11 before 1991), adding
another 130 species. 9,360 species were recognised. This should have been
called the third edition but wasn’t.
Wolters’
Die Vogelarten der Erde (1975~1982)
For
the classification of birds according to German-language names there was around
1970 no other work than the three bird volumes of the animal encyclopedia
Grzimek’s Animal Life (Zurich, Switzerland). The co-editors of these volumes 7
to 9, which appeared in 1968-1970, largely took over the classification of
Peters and updated it according to the state of knowledge at the time. But this
work is primarily a description of the birds and only provides an incomplete
accompanying classification.
In
1982 Hans Edmund Wolters’ Die Vogelarten der Erde, the Birds of the
Earth (Hamburg/Berlin), was initially published in seven partial deliveries, of
which the first appeared in 1975. Up to this point it was the only independent
classification with German bird names. With the division into 50 orders and 225
families however, this classification differs considerably from the
classifications discussed above. Columbiformes contained 7, and Psittaciformes
11 separate families, while all thrushes were directly within Muscicapidae, and
not in a subfamily Turdinae.
Since,
according to Wolters' view, ordinal names should be adapted to the names of the
typical families, Anseriformes is called Anatiformes and Galliformes becomes
Phasianiformes. Nine families (also) occurring in the Palearctic region are, in
contrast to Peters, Wetmore et al., raised to orders, namely the Otidiformes,
Ralliformes, Turniciformes, Lariformes, Alciformes, Pterocliformes,
Accipitriformes, Upupiformes and Alcediniformes, not following the ICZN code
(International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature).
A World Checklist of Birds by Burt L. Monroe, Jr., and Charles G. Sibley
(1993)
One
major attempt to rework the higher-level classification (and sequence) of birds
following Sibley & Ahlquist 1990 (pioneering DNA-DNA hybridisation studies
by the early 1970s in at the Yale University in New Haven, CT) has been
resisted because of uncertainties over the data and its analysis. The Sibley
‘tapestry’ (as his massive phylogeny of birds became known) was one of the
first major attempts to create a truly new classification since Fürbringer and
Gadow in the 1890s. Parts of the tapestry have since been confirmed or reworked
using other techniques, and the more robust conclusions have started to be
adopted.
These
early techniques have been replaced by newer ones based on mitochondrial DNA
sequences and molecular phylogenetics approaches that make use of computational
procedures for sequence alignment, construction of phylogenetic trees, and
calibration of molecular clocks to infer evolutionary relationships.
In
1993 the Sibley/Monroe checklist first appeared under as A World Checklist
of Birds, with the Whistlers (Thickheads), Vangas, Orioles, Drongos,
Monarchs, Birds of Paradise and Cuckooshrikes all within Corvidae, Babblers
within Sylviidae, Wrens and Gnatcatchers within Certhiidae, Mockingbirds within
Sturnidae, Flowerpeckers within Nectariniidae, Weavers, Accentors, Indigobirds,
Wagtails, Pipits and Waxwings within Passeridae, Chats and Robins, but also
Thrushes (Turdinae) within Muscicapidae, New World Sparrows, Wood Warblers,
Blackbirds, Cardinals and Tanagers within Fringillidae. It is worth mentioning
that the Sibley/Monroe checklist does not list subspecies, with the exception
of those under discussion, as separate species to be raised. A total of 9,700
species are listed.
By
1996, this checklist was for a while used for the Indian and Indochinese
region, but later on the more traditional order and family layout was adopted.
Birds of the World, a Check List by James F. Clements (1991 up to now)
The
1991 4th Clements Birds of the World Checklist made
use of ‘Distribution and Taxonomy of Birds of the World’ by Charles Sibley and
Burt L. Monroe, Jr., though it followed the higher-level taxonomy (i.e. Orders
and Families) set forth by Dr. Frank Gill in his ORNITHOLOGY (1990, New York,
NY). It was now published by Ibis Publishing Company (Vista, CA), set up by
Clements.
The
2000 5th Clements Birds of the World Checklist (designated as
the “official world checklist” of the American Birding Association and newly
including subspecies) has been changed from previous editions to mirror that of
the Handbook of the Birds of the World series (Lynx Edicíons,
Barcelona, 1992), sponsored by BirdLife International (a Cambridge, UK based
global partnership of conservation organisations that strives to conserve
birds). Handbook of the Birds of the World base sequence was intended to
follow that of Morony, Bock and Farrand (Reference List of Birds of the
World, 1975, American Museum of Natural History), with Walter J. Bock as
the consultant for systematics and nomenclature. One of the most valuable
things about HBW is that sufficient information is put
at our disposal to enable even lay readers to follow such disputes and
even to form their own opinion.
This
Clements Checklist was adopted in Asia as well at the turn of the century. The 2007 edition was published by Cornell
University Press (Ithaca, NY), and a digital update included a comprehensive
list of species having different common names in the Clements and IOC lists.
The Clements Checklist is now used by eBird,
an American-born online database of bird observations. By 2018, in the New
World, the Clements Checklist largely defers to the two AOS committees–the
North American Classification Committee (NACC) and the South American Classification
Committee (SACC)–with the goal of near-complete compliance. By now, all
taxonomic and nomenclatural decisions of the AOS, maintained by a democratic
member process, are automatically recognized by the ABA-CLC (American Birding
Association Checklist Committee).
In
addition to the formal taxonomic concepts that are included in the Clements
Checklist, the eBird taxonomy includes an expanded list of other bird taxa that
birders may report. Since eBird is becoming increasingly popular, more
non-American birders e.g. in Asia/China, are now switching to Clements.
Howard and Moore Complete Checklist of the Birds of the World
(2003~2014)
The
2003 3rd edition Howard and
Moore check list (cut-off date for incorporation of new material: 31 December
2000), again by Academic Press, and in America published at Princeton
University Press, New Jersey, was edited by the British ornithologist Edward C.
Dickinson, who handled Asia, supported by the Americans David Pearson (Africa)
and James Van Remsen Jr. (the Americas, and founder of the South American
Classification Committee, also member of the AOU Committee on Classification
and Nomenclature), Dutchman Cees S. Roselaar (Palearctic) and Australian
Richard Schodde. The birds were not classified according to order, which is
rather unusual for a classification list. Likewise, some genera are not
assigned to any family, as the assignment was not clear for the team of
authors. The sequence in which birds are listed is now meant to reflect their evolution. If one
were to draw an evolutionary tree of birds, those families that branch off
earliest (i.e. are the most ancient) should be listed first. 9,723 species were recognised.
It
is worth notifying that more than a quarter of the species that were upgraded
(split) to species from previous subspecies in the 1994 H&M edition, now
were lumped back to subspecies level. Two-thirds of these species were erected
by Sibley & Monroe in their 1990 list that was without subspecies. 1 out of
6 would be definitely lumped back in 2003, three-quarter consisting of species
introduced by Sibley & Monroe.
Thirty
species that were lumped by 1990, were brought back to species level later on.
Andrew
W. Kratter in The Auk (The American Ornithologists' Union), Volume 122, Issue
2, 1 April 2005, Pages 712–714: “Checklists produced in the interlude between Peters and Dickinson fell
short for a number of reasons, including out-of-date classifications, lack of
subspecific treatment, overly novel classification schemes, and partial to
complete lack of references. Justifications for taxonomic treatments have been
all but absent in those volumes, especially at levels other than species.” But
even in the Introduction of the 2003 H&M edition, it is said that a
subspecies of the relevant volume of Peters Check-list was listed even if no
subsequent evaluation of the hypothesis could be traced.
Edward
C. Dickinson also compiled the 2013 (non-Passerines) with help from James Van
Remsen Jr. and the 2014 (Passerines) edition, with help from Leslie Christidis
from Australia. Both volumes had support from The Natural History Museum (UK)
and from the American Museum of Natural History. This edition was published by
Aves Press Limited. The list sequence began to reflect the findings from
studies of avian DNA. This fourth edition of The Howard and Moore Complete
Checklist of the Birds of the World has been updated to reflect the
considerable change in the understanding of the evolution of birds derived from
the study of their DNA over the past decade; thus the Cracraft sequence,
adopted in 2003, is completely revised here. With 10,027 extant species
recognised, this edition again drew upon the expertise of regional consultants.
Cracraft is writing, that we are approaching the time, that the avian
systematic community will need to consider to breaking up the “Passeriformes”
into multiple orders.
At
this stage, a quarter of the species that were upgraded/split from previous
subspecies in the 1994 H&M edition, were lumped back, while 11% of the
ex-subspecies (40% of the lumped ones) were upgraded/split again by 2013 at
H&M, half consisting of species introduced by Sibley & Monroe. The
upgraded/split species that were kept so consisted for one-third of species
introduced by Sibley & Monroe.
Seventy-nine
species that changed the genus name by 1990, received the initial 1980 name
back at Howard and Moore later on.
By
2006, at both the Natural History Museum in London and Tring, and the American
Museum of Natural History in New York, the bird collection curators were happy
to use the Howard and Moore Complete Checklist as a regular working tool.
The
South American Classification Committee, founded in 1998, is an official
committee of the American Ornithological Society (the former American
Ornithologists' Union). The mission of this committee is to create a standard classification,
with English names, for the bird species of South America. The Howard and Moore
checklist (Dickinson 2003 and 2013/2014) provided the base list for the SACC.
However,
the 2013/2014 Howard and Moore checklist
apparently will be the last: in 2015 it was stated that a next edition would be
edited by Les Christidis, but in August 2018 he resigned. Proposed updates
weren’t released either.
But
even now, the writers of The Largest Avian Radiation (2020, Lynx
Edicíons), generally follow this Howard and Moore check list in respect to
their taxonomic overview.
BirdLife International/Handbook of the Birds of the World (BirdLife/HBW)
At
the same time, that the Howard and Moore checklist became history (looking
back), Lynx Edicíons and BirdLife International published the first ever
Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World (for non-passerines) in 2014
and the second volume (for Passerines) in 2016, when BirdLife/HBW
adopted and adapted a new species assessment method, now relying more on
visual, vocal and behavioral differences to define species than other
authorities, and less on genetic differences (which it still considers),
possibly partly due to the relative failure of the DNA-DNA hybridization
method.
“To
assess when newly described species or proposed splits make sense, BirdLife/HBW
is making use of systematic criteria, involving weighting morphological and
acoustic differences as compared with the nearest believed relative,
particularly intended to help make decisions regarding species that are
geographically isolated from each other.
Following
Joseph A. Tobias (2010, University of Oxford, UK),
preliminary tests show that these criteria result in relatively few (5%)
changes to avian taxonomy in Europe, yet are capable of extensive reassignment
of species limits in poorly known tropical regions. While we recognize that
species limits are in many cases inherently arbitrary, we argue that our system
can be applied to the global avifauna to deliver taxonomic decisions with a
high level of objectivity, consistency and transparency.”
This
method is disputed scientifically but eminently
pragmatic. The Scandinavian writers of the classification chapter in The
Largest Avian Radiation (2020), issued by Lynx Edicíons, the earlier HBW
publisher, state that a scoring system, based on distinctness, is not, in
principle, much different from the way in which taxonomy was practised 100
years ago. The approach specifically ignores genetic data in defining species
and some recommendations are in disagreement with genetic population structure,
while it does not take into account the fact that speciation dynamics differ
between Europe and the lower altitudes. Following Van Remsen (2015), HBW
suffers a lack of avian speciation scientists. The Howard and Moore checklist
is mentioned as one of the sources.
BirdLife/HBW
is followed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) for
the Red List of Threatened Species. Prior to
the publication of the first volume of this BirdLife/HBW Checklist, BirdLife
published an annually updated taxonomic checklist since 2007 based on the
taxonomies followed in a number of regional lists, often relying on Sibley
& Monroe.
IOC World Bird List (from 2007)
Since
2007 we have the digital IOC World Bird List by F. Gill & D.
Donsker, which is an open access resource of the international community of
ornithologists. Its primary goal is to facilitate worldwide communication in
ornithology and conservation based on an up-to-date evolutionary classification
of world birds and a set of English names that follow explicit guidelines for
spelling and construction. Though improved alignment and unification with the
other independent taxonomic works initially was set as a goal of the
International Ornithologists Union (Baton Rouge, LA), that started with a Round
Table discussion at the 2018 congress in Vancouver, BC, but that was before the
cease of the Howard and Moore checklist, and the merger of BirdLife/HBW and
Clements/eBird. The website project maintains an informal affiliation with the
IOU (International Ornithological Union, formerly known as the International
Ornithological Committee) and retains the well-established IOC name, a possible
acronym for the International Ornithological Community.
The
first International Ornithological Congress meeting was held in 1884, the next
will be held in Durban, South Africa after 4 years, in 2022.
From
December 2017, the BOU follows the IOC World Bird List, accompanied by a vast
number of people worldwide, (a smaller proportion in North America, though),
and it has been adopted by the latest 1,000-page photographic guide book in
China by Zhao Xinru.
Higher level taxonomy: evolutionary sequence in time, intelligence, or
colour?
Regarding
the sequence of bird families, Peters adopter the Wetmore order, ending with
the Icteridae, Thraupidae and Fringillidae (then incl. Emberizinae), but Mayr and Greenway,
appointed by the Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, chose in 1956
to follow the even arbitrary European-agreed sequence ending with the
Bowerbirds, Birds-of-Paradise, Corvids, which was copied by Howard and Moore
(and Morony), thereby apparently considering the crows’ intelligence more
important than their instinct.
In
2020, neurobiologist
Andreas Nieder of the University of Tübingen in Germany found that
“crows and probably other advanced birds have sensory awareness, in the sense
that they have specific subjective experiences that they can communicate.
Besides crows, this kind of neurobiological evidence for sensory consciousness
only exists in humans and macaque monkeys.”
Ernest
Thomas Gilliard’s (1958) Living Birds of the World, the first coffee
table bird book, that was also widely known in Europe (translated into German,
French, Spanish, Italian, Dutch), adopted Wetmore but placed the Ploceidae at
the end.
The
Spanish Handbook of the Birds of the World, starting in 1992, initially was to
cover 12 volumes ending with the Finches to Crows (à la Morony/Peters), but
after it was decided at the turn of the century to expand the series to 16
volumes, the last volume (2011) featured the Tanagers to new World Blackbirds,
i.e. Thraupidae, Cardinalidae, Emberizidae, Icteridae. Volume 15 ended with the
Fringillidae and Parulidae.
By
2003, Howard and Moore used the Cracraft sequence, ending with the Turdidae,
Muscicapidae, Cinclidae, but in 2013, this order was vice versa. With Clements
in 1991 ending with Fringillidae,
Parulidae, Emberizidae (incl. Cardinalinae and Thraupinae), Icteridae, following Dr.
Frank Gill until 2009, as did IOC until 2017, both by 2018/2019 adapted the
evolutionary sequence of Icteridae, Parulidae, Mitrospingidae, Cardinalidae,
Thraupidae following the new phylogenetic taxonomy provided by Frederick Keith
Barker et al. (2013, 2015, University of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN and initiator
of resurrecting Icteriidae), as did BirdLife/HBW for the last three families.
H&M
(2014) counts some 10,000 extant species, while the numbers at Clements, IOC
and BirdLife/HBW currently vary between 10,500 and 11,000.
Summary
So,
at the time that the American Peters’ Check-list was finished in 1987, only the
British Howard and
Moore check list, based on it as well as on the American Morony’s
Reference list of the birds of the world, itself also based on Peters,
practically was the world’s standard over the last 40 years, from 1980 on.
This
happened 50 years after this role was meant to be fulfilled by Peters Checklist,
which today is largely outdated with regard to the classification of bird
species into families and genera, but is still in use because of the
description of the species and subspecies, which is based on literature
citations.
The
1974 American Clements Birds of the World Checklist was primarily intended for
the birding community, then, by 1991 relied on Sibley and Monroe’s partly
tentative DNA-DNA hybridization achievements, after which it switched to
Spanish Lynx’ Handbook of the Birds of the World. Up to 2007, Clements’
list was still omitting all aspects of authorship or citation, making taxonomic
decisions impossible to track or verify, but thereafter update change
references were included.
In
2020 the exclusive digital rights to all the content of Handbook of
the Birds of the World were acquired from Lynx Edicíons by the Cornell Lab
of Ornithology (Cornell University, Ithaca, NY), with John W. Fitzpatrick
(*1951, USA) as director, and Irby Lovette (*1969, USA and initiator of the
Mitrospingidae, Nesospingidae and Spindalidae families) as director of the
‘Fuller’ Evolutionary Biology Program (2015 gift by Larry Fuller, who was a
star pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds baseball team: “We thought this would be a
great way to be sure the absolutely top scientists are attracted to the Lab of
Ornithology”). Birds of the World (BOW) is a powerful online research database that is
striving for scientific consensus between the BirdLife/HBW
taxonomy and the Clements taxonomy.
Though
superorders and other lineages above the order level (in non-passerines) and
below the order level (in passerines) are not mentioned, the IOC
World Bird List in the meantime seemingly deserves the title of the world’s
standard, with renowned ornithologists as advisers, such as Per Alström (*1961,
Sweden), Jon Fjeldså (*1942, Norway, working in Denmark), Alan P. Peterson
(*1953, USA), Douglas Pratt (*1944, USA), Robert S. Ridgely (*1946, USA), Nigel
Redman (*1952, United Kingdom), George Sangster (*1970, the Netherlands, also
working in Sweden), Frank Rheindt (*1977, Germany, working in Singapore) and
Richard Schodde (*1936, Australia).
Sources: publicly accessible internet sites
A complete checklist of he Birds of the World, Richard Howard and Alick Moore,
Oxford University Press, 1980
Homepage of this file
September
2021