Introduction

Part 1. Northern Melanesia's Physical and Biological Environment

1. Geology and geological history

2. Climate

3. Habitats and vegetation

4. Terrestrial vertebrates other than birds

Part 2. Human History and Impacts

5. Human history

6. Ornithological exploration of Northern Melanesia

7. Exterminations of bird populations

Part 3. The Northern Melanesia Avifauna

8. Family composition

9. Determinants of island species number

10. Level of endemism, habitat preference, and abundance of each species

11. Overwater dispersal ability of each species

12. Distributional ecology

Part 4. Colonization Routes

13. Proximate origins of Northern Melanesian populations

14. Upstream colonization and faunal dominance

15. Ultimate origins of Northern Melanesian populations

Part 5. Taxonomic Analysis: Differences among Species

16. The problem of speciation

17. Stages of geographic speciation among the birds of Northern Melanesia

18. Absence of geographic variation

19. Geographic variation: subspecies

20. Geographic variation: megasubspecies

21. Geographic variation: allospecies

22. Complete speciation

23. Hybridization

24. Endemic species and genera

Part 6. Geographical Analysis: Differences among Islands

25. Endemism index

26. Pair-wise differentiation index

27. Pair-wise non-sharing indices: differences in island species compositions

28. The establishment of geographic isolates

29. Inter-archipelagal barriers

30. Barriers within the Bismarcks

31. Barriers within the Solomons

32. Speciation on fragmented Solomon islands

33. Differential extinction and species occurrences on fragmented Pleistocene islands

Part 7. Synthesis, Conclusions, and Prospects

34. Conclusions about speciation

35. Species differences: taxon cycles, and the evolution of dispersal

36. Promising directions for future research

Maps

Appendices

References

Index  less