[Fred Ruhe]

Someone who calls him/herself Albertonykus published an alphabetical list of extinct Cenozoic birdgenera. For those interested it can be found here:

https://albertonykus.blogspot.com/20...f-extinct.html

Fred

[Welsh Peregrine]

Albertonykus is PhD researcher Albert Chen

[Fred Ruhe]

Originally Posted by Welsh Peregrine

Albertonykus is PhD researcher Albert Chen

Well, Albert made a rather useless list.

Some critics: no families mentioned, no authors, no type species indicated, no references, no modern genera with extinct species etc. etc., just names. (I did not even check whether the list is complete, I found it too disappointing), but on the other hand, perhaps he will improve it, I am glad I have my own list.

Fred

[albertonykus]

Hello Fred,

Many thanks for your regular posts in this subforum; I've personally found them very helpful for staying up to date. Thanks as well for sharing the link to my list.

Regarding your critiques, you're quite right that I don't properly cite the sources for the information I included. As I explained in my blog post introducing the list, it was inspired by the lists of Mesozoic dinosaurs that are commonly compiled in the paleontology community, which, yes, are often little more than lists of names with no sources beyond maybe authorship. (Examples of such lists can be found here and here, as well as my own list of Mesozoic maniraptorans, which is in the same format.) I would never recommend my list for technical use, except perhaps as a starting point. The main purpose of setting it up was for the fun of maintaining such a list, and to provide a source of information for more casual fans of fossil birds who might not feel an immediate need to delve into the scientific literature. I am happy to provide my sources for specific statements if anyone asks though.

If given the choice, I do not practice ranked taxonomy, so I do not consider "families" to be any more significant than other levels of taxonomic organization. However, I did try to make reasonably specific statements about phylogenetic position where possible (e.g.: I mention that Eurotrochilus is a stem-hummingbird, that Hakawai is closely related to seedsnipe and the plains-wanderer, that Psittacopes might be a stem-passerine, etc.). In addition, though I do not explicitly say so, for genera known from more than one species I always listed the type species first.

I do acknowledge that the absence of extant genera with extinct species is one of the biggest flaws of my list. That is something I intend to fix in the future. However, given the amount of time and effort I've already spent compiling the extinct genera and the greater challenge of assessing the current taxonomic status of extinct species assigned to extant genera, I'm going to cut myself some slack for the time being. I hope you understand.

A major motivator for me in compiling the list was the fact that I could not find any up to date list of extinct Cenozoic birds anywhere. Since you already have one of your own, might I encourage you to make your list publicly available? I understand if it is intended only as a personal reference, but I believe it would be a highly valuable resource to the community if it was made accessible (and certainly more useful than mine).

[Fred Ruhe]

Hello Albert,

Welcome to birdforum, I hope you will like your stay here. I try to keep our forum members updated with everything that is going on in Avian Paleontology.

I appreciate your efforts to maintain a list, I only think it could be very much more informative. Indeed I have my own list and I am able to send you a copy of it if you send me your e-mail address (you can do so by clicking my name and send me a private message, this offer is open for anybody), the list contains all fossil birdspecies known to me: Mesozoic as well as Cenozoic with their name, (holo)types, diagnosis, locus typicus, etymology and distribution. It is in Dutch and not ment for publication and it is accompanied with a long reference list that also indicates whether I have the paper electronic file of it.

The lists of fossil birds and references are to long to publish on birdforum. I find them very usefull and use them all the time and is updated when needed.

Hope you like it and all the best,

Fred

[albertonykus]

I concur that there is ample space for improvement in my list. It is probable that I will expand it with more information in the future. Nonetheless, I believe there is room in the world for both the technical reference that you expected and the more casual resource I intended.

Many thanks for the offer to share your list! Obviously, such a list would be too long to be posted on a forum; my suggestion was more in regards to the possibility of hosting it on a website of your own. In any case, I will be in touch.

[Fred Ruhe]

Originally Posted by albertonykus

Many thanks for the offer to share your list! Obviously, such a list would be too long to be posted on a forum; my suggestion was more in regards to the possibility of hosting it on a website of your own. In any case, I will be in touch.

I am to old and to stuped to make a website, I like to spend my time on fossil birds, not on ITT.

Fred