Charadriiformes
Shorebirds and relatives
John Harshman and Joseph W. BrownThis tree diagram shows the relationships between several groups of organisms.
The root of the current tree connects the organisms featured in this tree to their containing group and the rest of the Tree of Life. The basal branching point in the tree represents the ancestor of the other groups in the tree. This ancestor diversified over time into several descendent subgroups, which are represented as internal nodes and terminal taxa to the right.
You can click on the root to travel down the Tree of Life all the way to the root of all Life, and you can click on the names of descendent subgroups to travel up the Tree of Life all the way to individual species.
For more information on ToL tree formatting, please see Interpreting the Tree or Classification. To learn more about phylogenetic trees, please visit our Phylogenetic Biology pages.
close boxReferences
Baker, A. J., S. L. Pereira, and T. A. Paton. 2007. Phylogenetic relationships and divergence times of Charadriiformes genera: Multigene evidence for he Cretaceous origin of at least 14 clades of shorebirds. Biology Letters 3:205-209.
Chu, P.C. 1995. Phylogenetic reanalysis of Strauch's osteological data set for the Charadriiformes. Condor 97:174-196.
Crochet, P.-A., F. Bonhomme, and J. D. Lebreton. 2000. Molecular phylogeny and plumage evolution in gulls (Larini). J. Evol. Biol. 13:47-57.
Ericson, P. G. P., I. Envall, M. Irestedt, and J. A. Norman. 2003. Inter-familial relationships of the shorebirds (Aves : Charadriiformes) based on nuclear DNA sequence data. BMC Evol. Biol. 3:16.
Fain, M. G., and P. Houde. 2004. Parallel radiations in the primary clades of birds. Evolution 58:2558-2573.
Harshman, J. 1994. Reweaving the Tapestry: What can we learn from Sibley and Ahlquist (1990)? Auk 111:377-388.
Hayman, P., J. Marchant, and T. Prater. 1986. Shorebirds: an identification guide to the waders of the world. Houghton Mifflin, Boston.
Paton, T. A., A. J. Baker, J. G. Groth, and G. F. Barrowclough. 2003. RAG-1 sequences resolve phylogenetic relationships within Charadriiform birds Mol. Phylogenet. Evol. 29:268-278.
Rosair, D. 1995. Photographic Guide to the Shorebirds of the World. New York: Facts on File.
Sibley, C. G., and J. A. Ahlquist. 1990. Phylogeny and classification of birds, Yale U. Press, New Haven.
Soothill, E. and R. Soothill. 1989. Wading Birds of the World. 2nd ed. London: Blandford.
Thomas, G. H., M. A. Wills, and T. Szekely. 2004. A supertree approach to shorebird phylogeny. BMC Evol. Biol. 4:28.
Thomas, G. H., M. A. Wills, and T. Szekely. 2004. Phylogeny of shorebirds, gulls, and alcids (Aves: Charadrii) from the cytochrome-b gene: Parsimony, Bayesian inference, minumum evolution, and quartet puzzling. Mol. Phylogen. Evol. 30, 516-526.
van Tuinen, M., D. B. Butvill, J. A. W. Kirsch, and S. B. Hedges. 2001. Convergence and divergence in the evolution of aquatic birds. Proc. Roy. Soc. Lond. 268B:1-6.
van Tuinen, M., D. Waterhouse, and G. J. Dyke. 2004. Avian molecular systematics on the rebound: a fresh look at modern shorebird phylogenetic relationships. J. Avian Biol. 35:191-194.
Whittingham, L. A., F. H. Sheldon, and S. T. Emlen. 2000. Molecular phylogeny of jacanas and its implications for morphologic and biogeographic evolution. The Auk 117:22–32.
About This Page
Joseph W. Brown
University of Michigan Museum of Zoology, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
Correspondence regarding this page should be directed to John Harshman at and Joseph W. Brown at
Page copyright © 2008 and Joseph W. Brown
Page: Tree of Life Charadriiformes. Shorebirds and relatives. Authored by John Harshman and Joseph W. Brown. The TEXT of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License - Version 3.0. Note that images and other media featured on this page are each governed by their own license, and they may or may not be available for reuse. Click on an image or a media link to access the media data window, which provides the relevant licensing information. For the general terms and conditions of ToL material reuse and redistribution, please see the Tree of Life Copyright Policies.
- First online 14 December 2005
- Content changed 24 June 2008
Citing this page:
Harshman, John and Joseph W. Brown. 2008. Charadriiformes. Shorebirds and relatives. Version 24 June 2008 (temporary). http://tolweb.org/Charadriiformes/26342/2008.06.24 in The Tree of Life Web Project, http://tolweb.org/