Over the past eight years, members of the NHM Bird Group (Ben Warren, Julian Hume and myself) have conducted research into the evolution and extinction of birds in the Mascarenes, Seychelles and Comoros, supported currently by a centenary grant from the Percy Sladen Memorial Fund. The region is an interesting one biogeographically as it includes islands with ages ranging from a few tens of thousands up to over fifty million years, which man has colonized only recently but on which he has nevertheless wreaked massive environmental change. Our studies have included both molecular research aimed at establishing phylogenies for species in genera that have radiated widely across the islands and also palaeontological and archival investigation aimed at determining the extinction impact that the arrival of man has had in the Mascarene islands in particular. My talk will review key findings to date and discuss on-going studies, in particular those currently underway in conjunction with Dutch and Mauritian colleagues at the extraordinarily rich sub-fossil site at the Mare aux Songes, Mauritius (see Nature 443: 138-140, 2006)

Robert Prys-Jones