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| About the network | |
PLEASE NOTE: The ORNIS community website is currently down and you have been rerouted to the data search portal instead.
We are working to restore the files and resources that you are accustomed to finding on the community site. If you need
any information from the community site (e.g. georeferencing files or repatriated data), please contact Laura Russell, VertNet Programmer.
Approximately 5 million bird specimens are housed in North American biocollections, documenting the global composition,
identity, spatial distribution, ecology, systematics, and history of the world's estimated 10,000-16,000 bird species. Furthermore, millions of
additional observational records are held in diverse data sets. ORNIS addresses the urgent call for increased access to these data across collections
and databases, in an open and collaborative manner, and involves development of a suite of online software tools for data analysis and error-checking.
This project, funded by the National Science Foundation, expands on existing infrastructure developed for distributed mammal (MaNIS), amphibian and
reptile (HerpNet), and fish (FishNet) databases. Improved access to avian data sets will allow predictive uses to reveal patterns and processes of
evolutionary and ecological phenomena that have not been apparent heretofore. In conjunction with similar infrastructures for other vertebrate groups,
it also will enable detailed and synthetic knowledge of the earth's biodiversity for tracking climate change, emerging diseases (e.g., West Nile Virus),
and other conservation challenges for species in the 21st century.
Disclaimer and Use of ORNIS Data
Data records provided by ORNIS may be used by individual researchers or research groups, but they
may not be repackaged, resold, or redistributed in any form without the express written consent of
the original institution where those records are held.
Although institutions routinely update their data, outdated taxonomic names, mistaken specimen identifications, erroneous localities, and other problems inevitably occur. Investigators should verify data by direct examination of specimens, and notify the original institution if discrepancies are found.
Citations
Publications resulting from the use of ORNIS should list the names of each
institution whose data were used, and ORNIS (http://ornisnet.org) as the portal by which the data
were accessed or downloaded. The citation also should list the date that the data were accessed
via ORNIS. Users should refer to individual institutional policies on proper citation of data from
those providers.
Example: Data were obtained from records held in the following institutions and accessed through the ORNIS data portal (http://ornisnet.org) on 7 November 2005: California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco; Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley. [etc.].
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