Search
Division of
Birds
Ornithology is the study of birds. Birds are distinguished from other living vertebrates by three things: feathers, hollow bones, and hard shelled eggs. Birds are found worldwide, and roughy 10,000 species are known to exist. Ornithological research emcompasses many branches, including taxonomy, evolution, anatomy, ecology, conservation biology and wildlife management. The Division of Birds serves the research community through the research of our scientists and stewardship of the bird collections.
Access the Collections
The Division of Birds, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, houses and maintains the third largest bird collection in the world with over 640,000 specimens. Our National Collection, known in the ornithological literature by the acronym USNM (referring to our former name of United States National Museum), has representatives of about 85% of the approximately 10,000 known species in the world's avifauna.
