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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 MELANESIAN 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 Fuanal Dominance; 15. Ultimate Origins of Northern Melanesian Populations; PART 5: TAXONOMIC ANALYSIS: DIFFERENCES AMONG SPECIES; 16. The Problem of Speciation; 17. Stages of Geographical 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. Completed Speciation; 23. Hybridization; 24. Endemic Species and Genera; PART 6: GEOGRAPHIC ANALYSIS: DIFFERENCES AMONG ISLANDS; 25. Endemism Index; 26. Pairwise Differentiation Index; 27. Pairwise Nonsharing Indices: Differences in Island Species Compositions; 28. The Establishment of Geographic Isolates; 29. Interarchipelagal 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; APPENDIX 1: SYSTEMATIC LIST: BREEDING LAND AND FRESHWATER NATIVE BIRDS OF NORTHERN MELANESIA; APPENDIX 2: NONBREEDING VISITORS TO NORTHERN MELANESIA; APPENDIX 3: INTRODUCED BIRD SPECIES IN NORTHERN MELANESIA; APPENDIX 4: CHRONOLOGIES OF ORNITHOLOGICAL EXPLORATION; APPENDIX 5: ATTRIBUTES OF EACH BIRD SPECIES; APPENDIX 6: EVIDENCE OF OVERWATER DISPERSAL ABILITY OF EACH SPECIES AND ALLOSPECIES IN THE BISMARCKS AND SOLOMONS; APPENDIX 7: DISTRIBUTIONS AND ORIGINS OF NORTHERN MELANESIAN BIRD POPULATIONS; REFERENCES; INDEX