The Biodiversity of Birds

Episode: 3SummaryBirds are an incredibly successful and diverse group of animals. In this episode, you’ll get an overview of the origin of avian species diversity and its present-day distribution across the planet.I offer some definitions of ‘biodiversity’ with respect to birds. We’ll discuss why this diversity is important.Links to Some Things Mentioned in this EpisodeClements Checklist of the Birds of the WorldResearch Citations‍Genetic research leading to the species split between the Winter Wren and Pacific Wren (Toews and Irwin. 2008. Molecular Ecology)Errors and ClarificationsClarification - 07:25 - I say that the Clements Checklist has 10,721 bird species. This is true. However, this number includes about 160 extinct species. So this means there are 10,561 extant (i.e. living, non-extinct) bird species on the planet today.Link to this episode on the Science of Birds websiteSupport the show