In the early 20th century (1911-1915), Frank Chapman of the American Museum of Natural History, led a series of ornithological expeditions that visited 74 localities throughout Colombia, which produced an extraordinary database on the distribution and community composition of the country’s birds. This information has served to document local extinctions that occurred concurrent with landscape transformation during the 20th century, and to identify vulnerable species. However, the potential of this information to address questions about avian ecology, evolution, and conservation on large scales remains to be fully exploited. We intend to resurvey Chapman’s sites to document the current status and past changes of bird assemblages and their habitats throughout the country, and to establish a quantitative, publicly-available database for future assessments and monitoring.
