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Recordset

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KUBI Ornithology Collection

Specimen Records: 126,197
Media Records: 2,009
iDigBio Last Ingested Date: 2023-05-05

The Ornithology group in the Biodiversity Institute at the University of Kansas conducts research and provides undergraduate and graduate education on the birds of the world. Research topics include the species limits and species diversity, evolution, geography, genetics and genomics, morphology, conservation, ecology, and behavior. This work is greatly enhanced by extensive research collections of world birds, numbering more than 107,000 specimens, many of which are recently collected as part of the group's global bird sampling program.<br /> <br /> Ornithology's study skin collections total about 60,000 specimens. The historical collections are strongest for the Great Plains of the United States and for Mexico, with additional holdings from Central and South America, Borneo, and Kenya. Recent large-scale collections have built significant recent holdings from Mexico, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Panama, Guyana, Peru, Paraguay, Argentina, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Botswana, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mongolia, China, Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Fiji, Palau, and others. Collections of special importance include series of more than 14,000 House Sparrow (Passer domesticus), which formed the basis for landmark scientific research by Richard Johnston and his students; extensive series of several North American species (Red-winged Blackbird Agelaius phoeniceus, meadowlarks Sturnella spp., Horned LarkEremophila alpestris); series documenting many of the Great Plains hybrid zones; and the feathers of an extinct moa (Dinornithidae). Recent additions include extensive series from Guyana, Mexico, Panama, Peru, and Paraguay, including many species otherwise poorly represented in scientific collections.<br /> <br /> The avian osteological collections are extensive, totaling over 32,500 specimens, and ranked third largest in the world (Wood and Schnell 1986). This component of the collection has important strengths from the Great Plains of the United States, Mexico, and northern South America. Important holdings include critical and unique Ecuadorian series, extensive recent Australian material, and a large series of steamer-ducks (Tachyeres sp.). Recent collecting activities have built South American skeletal holdings into an important collection, with material from poorly represented sectors such as the Atlantic Forest, the Yucatan Peninsula, Guyana, and montane Central America.<br /> <br />   Although fluid-preserved specimens were not an early focus of Ornithology activities, the collections at KU were ranked seventh in North America at the time of the last summary of anatomical holdings (Wood et al. 1982). More recently, as part of Prum's research program, these collections have grown significantly, with important holdings of suboscine passeriform birds, among other groups. Now housed with ample space and ideal storage conditions in an NSF- and State of Kansas-funded addition, this collection is seeing increased research applications.

Contacts

Name Andrew Bentley
RoleBioinformatics Manager
Emailabentley@ku.edu
Name Mark Robbins
RoleCollection Manager
Emailmrobbins@ku.edu
Name A. Townsend Peterson
RoleCurator
Emailtown@ku.edu
Name Robert Moyle
RoleCurator in Charge
Emailmoyle@ku.edu
Name Mark Robbins
RoleCollection Manager
Emailmrobbins@ku.edu
  • Data Corrected
  • Data Use
  • Raw
This table shows any data corrections that were performed on this recordset to improve the capabilities of iDigBio Search. The first column represents the correction performed. The last two columns represent the number and percentage of records that were corrected. A complete list of the data quality flags and their descriptions can be found here. Clicking on a data flag name will take you to a search for all records with this flag in this recordset.
FlagRecords With This Flag(%) Percent With This Flag
dwc_datasetid_added  i122187
96.822
dwc_parentnameusageid_added  i122187
96.822
dwc_taxonid_added  i122187
96.822
dwc_taxonomicstatus_added  i122187
96.822
dwc_taxonrank_added  i122187
96.822
gbif_canonicalname_added  i122187
96.822
gbif_genericname_added  i122187
96.822
gbif_taxon_corrected  i122187
96.822
dwc_scientificnameauthorship_added  i121022
95.899
idigbio_isocountrycode_added  i120897
95.8
gbif_vernacularname_added  i120381
95.391
gbif_reference_added  i119535
94.721
dwc_multimedia_added  i110944
87.913
dwc_country_replaced  i62368
49.421
dwc_originalnameusageid_added  i58925
46.693
dwc_continent_replaced  i32684
25.899
geopoint_datum_missing  i32672
25.89
dwc_family_replaced  i10386
8.23
taxon_match_failed  i9070
7.187
dwc_infraspecificepithet_added  i6425
5.091
dwc_specificepithet_replaced  i3858
3.057
rev_geocode_eez  i2259
1.79
dwc_genus_replaced  i2242
1.777
geopoint_low_precision  i1802
1.428
rev_geocode_mismatch  i951
0.754
dwc_taxonremarks_added  i755
0.598
dwc_stateprovince_replaced  i730
0.578
rev_geocode_failure  i550
0.436
rev_geocode_corrected  i539
0.427
rev_geocode_lat_sign  i353
0.28
dwc_order_replaced  i265
0.21
rev_geocode_lon_sign  i178
0.141
rev_geocode_eez_corrected  i128
0.101
geopoint_datum_error  i104
0.082
dwc_kingdom_suspect  i80
0.063
dwc_infraspecificepithet_replaced  i54
0.043
geopoint_bounds  i18
0.014
rev_geocode_flip  i8
0.006
geopoint_pre_flip  i5
0.004
datecollected_bounds  i1
0.001
specimen list