Skip to main content
Dryad

AVOTREX: A global dataset of extinct birds and their traits (v. 1.0)

Data files

Oct 26, 2024 version files 1.86 MB
Jan 22, 2025 version files 1.86 MB

Abstract

Human activities have been reshaping the natural world for tens of thousands of years, leading to the extinction of hundreds of bird species. Past research has provided evidence of extinction selectivity towards certain groups of species, but trait information is lacking for the majority of clades, especially for prehistoric extinctions identified only through subfossil remains. This incomplete knowledge potentially obscures the structure of natural communities, undermining our ability to infer changes in biodiversity across space and time. Biases in currently available trait data also limit our ability to identify drivers and processes of extinction. Here we present AVOTREX, an open-access database of species traits for all birds known to have gone extinct in the last 130,000 years. This database provides detailed morphological information for 610 extinct species.

For each extinct bird species, we provide information on the taxonomy, geographic location, and period of extinction. We also present data on island endemicity, flight ability and body mass, as well as standard measurements of external (matching the AVONET database of extant birds) and skeletal morphology from museum specimens where available. To ensure comprehensive morphological data coverage, we estimate all missing morphological measurements using a data imputation technique based on machine learning. This method can integrate measurements from different sources (i.e. skeletal and skin material), together with taxonomic information, and allows us to provide complete information on standard morphological traits of all known extinct birds.