AVONICHE: A global dataset of dietary and foraging niches for birds

Sayol, Ferran 1 2 ; Neate-Clegg, Monte3; Sheard, Catherine3 4; Pigot, Alex L.5; Tobias, Joseph A.6

Published Dec 16, 2025 on Dryad. https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.1zcrjdg56

Data files

Dec 16, 2025 version files 8.22 MB

Abstract

The role of each animal species in an ecosystem is largely determined both by the resources it uses and the behaviours through which these resources are obtained. Even in well-studied vertebrate groups, like birds, quantitative data on the relative use of different food resources in the context of foraging strategies is generally lacking. Most analyses in macroecology, macroevolution, and conservation biology are therefore limited to simplified dietary categories, ignoring the specific foraging behaviours and substrates used to access resources. Here we present AVONICHE, a dataset quantifying proportional membership in 32 foraging niches, representing a combination of dietary categories and associated foraging strategies used by all bird species. The dataset includes species-level information on the proportional use of the 32 foraging niches, each of which is defined as a particular foraging strategy within a specific dietary category (e.g., invertebrate feeding is subdivided into 7 foraging niches based on different foraging behaviours). The data includes information for all extant bird species (Class Aves). To allow integration with global phylogenies and other data resources published in future, we align species-level niche data with four different taxonomic treatments: BirdTree (9,993 species), Clements/eBird (10,661 species), BirdLife International (10,999 species), and the new AviList taxonomy (10,981 species).

Dataset DOI: 10.5061/dryad.1zcrjdg56

Description of the data and file structure

The dataset includes species-level information on the proportional use across 32 foraging niches, each of which is defined as a particular foraging strategy within a specific dietary category. The data includes information for all extant bird species (Class Aves). To allow integration with a global phylogeny and other data resources, we align species-level niche data with four different taxonomic treatments: BirdTree (9,993 species), Clements/eBird (10,661 species), BirdLife International (10,999 species), and the new AviList taxonomy (10,981 species).

Files and variables

File structure

The AVONICHE dataset is composed of 4 main datasets:

Avoniche1_Birdlife2020.csv: Dataset with quantitative information on dietary and foraging niches for 10,999 species following the BirdLife International taxonomy (version 2020).
Avoniche2_eBird2021.csv: Dataset with quantitative information on dietary and foraging niches for 10,661 species following the Clements/eBird taxonomy (version 2021).
Avoniche3_BirdTree2012.csv: Dataset with quantitative information on dietary and foraging niches for 9,993 species following the BirdTree taxonomy (2012).
Avoniche4_AviList_2025.csv: Dataset with quantitative information on dietary and foraging niches for 10,981 species following the AviList taxonomy (2025).

In addition, we also provide the following accompanying files:

Avoniche_metadata.xlsx: It includes a list of all variables from the other spreadsheets, with a description, variable type, and source.
Crosswalk_sp1_sp2.csv: Crosswalk between BirdLife (Sp1) and eBird2021 taxonomies (Sp2).
Crosswalk_sp1_sp3.csv: Crosswalk between BirdLife (Sp1) and BirdTree taxonomies (Sp3).
Avoniche_Pigot2020_match.csv: Table matching the names used for diet or foraging niches in Avoniche with a previous related dataset (Pigot et al. 2020).

Main variables included:

Each dataset (Sp1, Sp2, Sp3, Sp4) contains quantitative information on the usage of 9 dietary niches and 32 foraging niches.

The 9 dietary niches include: Plants aquatic (Pa), Plants terrestrial (Pt), Nectar (Ne), Seeds (Se), Fruit (Fr), Invertebrates (In), Aquatic prey (Ap), Vertebrates (Vt) & Carrion (Ca).

The 32 dietary niches are combinations of dietary categories and associated foraging strategies and include: Plants Aquatic Ground, Plants Aquatic Surface, Plants Aquatic Dive, Plants Elevated, Plants Ground, Nectar Aerial, Nectar Glean, Seeds Elevated, Seeds Ground, Fruit Aerial, Fruit Glean, Fruit Ground, Invertebrates Aerial Screening, Invertebrates Sally-to-Air, Invertebrates Sally-to-Surface, Invertebrates Sally-to-Ground, Invertebrates Vertical Substrate, Invertebrates Glean Elevated, Invertebrates Glean Ground, Aquatic Predator Air, Aquatic Predator Plunge, Aquatic Predator Perch, Aquatic Predator Ground, Aquatic Predator Surface, Aquatic Predator Dive, Vertebrates Aerial Screening, Vertebrates Air-to-Surface, Vertebrates Perch, Vertebrates Glean Elevated, Vertebrates Glean Ground, Carrion Aquatic & Carrion Ground.