The Zooarchaeology Lab's Bird Collection encompasses 147 specimens, primarily from California and Nevada, represent 70 different species.
David Hurst Thomas initiated the Bird Collection in the late 1960s while he was conducting archaeological research in Nevada. Since that time, the collection increased in an ad-hoc manner by graduate students and other researchers, including Tim Carpenter, Michael Delacorte, Anastasia Leigh, Dwight Simons, and Peter Schulz, while they were preparing specimens. After 2001, Christyann Darwent expanded the collection with specimens of numerous California species as well as birds that breed in the Arctic.