Columbiformes are an avian

Bird

Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...

 order

Order (biology)

In scientific classification used in biology, the order is# a taxonomic rank used in the classification of organisms. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, family, genus, and species, with order fitting in between class and family...

 that includes the very widespread and successful doves and pigeons, classified in the family

Family (biology)

In biological classification, family is* a taxonomic rank. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species, with family fitting between order and genus. As for the other well-known ranks, there is the option of an immediately lower rank, indicated by the...

 Columbidae, and the extinct Dodo

Dodo

The dodo was a flightless bird endemic to the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius. Related to pigeons and doves, it stood about a meter tall, weighing about , living on fruit, and nesting on the ground....

 and the Rodrigues Solitaire

Rodrigues Solitaire

The Rodrigues Solitaire was a flightless member of the pigeon order endemic to Rodrigues, Mauritius. It was a close relative of the Dodo.-Discovery:...

, long classified as a second family Raphidae

Raphidae

The Raphinae are a subfamily of extinct flightless birds colloquially called didines or didine birds. They inhabited the Mascarene Islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues, but became extinct through hunting by humans and predation by introduced non-native mammals following human colonisation in the 17th...

. 313 species, found worldwide, comprise the Columbiformes order. Like many birds, all Columbiformes are monogamous. Unlike most other birds, however, they are capable of drinking by sucking up water, without needing to tilt the head back.

Taxonomy

The Pteroclididae

Sandgrouse

The sandgrouse are a family, Pteroclididae, of 16 bird species, the only living members of the order Pteroclidiformes. They are restricted to treeless open country in the Old World, such as plains and semi-deserts. They are distributed across northern, southern and eastern Africa as well as...

 (sandgrouse) were formerly included in this order largely due to this drinking behavior ("The only other group, however, which shows the same behavior, the Pteroclididae, is placed near the doves just by this doubtlessly very old characteristic."); more recently, it had been reported that they cannot drink by "sucking" or "pumping", and they are now treated separately in the order Pteroclidiformes and are considered to be closer to the shorebirds.

Osteology

Osteology

Osteology is the scientific study of bones. A subdiscipline of anatomy, anthropology, and archeology, osteology is a detailed study of the structure of bones, skeletal elements, teeth, morphology, function, disease, pathology, the process of ossification , the resistance and hardness of bones , etc...

 and DNA sequence

DNA sequence

The sequence or primary structure of a nucleic acid is the composition of atoms that make up the nucleic acid and the chemical bonds that bond those atoms. Because nucleic acids, such as DNA and RNA, are unbranched polymers, this specification is equivalent to specifying the sequence of...

 analyses indicate that the Dodo

Dodo

The dodo was a flightless bird endemic to the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius. Related to pigeons and doves, it stood about a meter tall, weighing about , living on fruit, and nesting on the ground....

 and Rodrigues Solitaire are better considered as a subfamily Raphinae in the Columbidae pending availability of further information.

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