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What field guide is best for South Africa? (1 Viewer)

Amy Meyers

New member
Hi, I'm new to these forums. My husband and I are missionaries to a rural area of Limpopo province in South Africa. We wanted to be able to identify birds around here with our children. Here is a list of bird field guides I was directed to.

Roberts Bird Guide
Robert’s Bird Guide – KNP and Adjacent Lowveld
Roberts Guide to the Nests and Eggs
Roberts Geographic Variation of Southern African Birds
Newman’s Birds of Southern Africa
Sasol Birds of Southern Africa (4th edition)
LBJ’s Made Simple
Birds the Inside Story - Sasol
Southern African and Madagascar Birdfinder - Sasol
Beat About the Bush – Birds – Carnaby *This is most expensive, and I was thinking not to get this one.
Complete Photo Guide Birds of South Africa
What’s that Bird?
Nocturnal Birds of SA
Shorebirds of South Africa

Which would be best? Most thorough and accessible for children? Best for Limpopo/Gauteng/Mozambique/southern Zim region?

Thanks in advance for your help! And if you have any advice on field guides for other flora and fauna, we would appreciate it! :t:
 
Newmans birds of Southern Africa is the apex book on birds.

It was the required book in school for my wildlife management classes.
 
I would slightly disagree with the previous poster - I think Sasol is best overall, but perhaps for children a less comprehensive guide could be better, ie. a guide limited to birds within Limpopo. Southern Africa has an amazing variety of species, many restricted to certain areas (eg. Namibia, western areas, the Cape, etc) - Sasol and Newmans and the standard Roberts illustrate all (over 900 species I seem to remember, so perhaps a Limpopo guide would be easier for children to plough through than the umpteen pages of similar species that do not occur in their area. I do not know Robert’s Bird Guide to KNP and Adjacent Lowveld, but it may be a good option for this reason.
 
Amy, welcome to birdforum!

I used version 3 of this one for my trip to SA/Zim and was very happy: Sasol Birds of Southern Africa (4th edition)

You know your kids and can better judge if a full size field guide is too much.

If you at any time enter Kruger, they have a little brochure that contains drawings of all the common birds and mammals for that area and maps.

Niels
 
Hi Amy and welcome to the forum. I use Sasol as a field guide and I am very happy with it. However Newmans is also a good guide and is considered by some people to have the edge in terms of accuracy of illustration. I don't know how old your children are, but I see no reason why they should not use the same guide as you do if they are interested. The Sasol version of LBJs made simple comes with a CD of bird calls and is a very well thought out little book which could be a helpful addition. Best wishes with your birding and I hope you will start posting some of your sightings on the South |African thread.
 
Land Mammals of Southern Africa by Reay Smithers is a good basic reference and WESSA produces a Field Guide to the Antelope of Southern Africa which is a small, budget paperback crammed with information. For the future, you could look towards getting the Raptor Guide of Southern Africa by Oberprieler and Cillie- extremely helpful if the SASOL has not enough to help you distinguish a particular raptor.
 
And where one can find the so called "South African thread"?

The thread in question is called the Southern African Forum - found under 'South Africa", same as this thread. It has many posts, and a great deal of birding info about Southern Africa. We look forward to seeing you there.
Best wishes,
Dave
 
I use the following
Sasol Birds of Southern Africa

but have a Roberts that is specific to the area around the Western Cape
Several Roberts books do focus on the slight sub species differences between areas

They are expensive, (compared with prices on Amazon Europe), in the Book shops in SA - although with the fall in the Rand maybe not anymore.

It is a pity that you cannot get hold of a few copy's of some good used books, (as they will not have changed much), as a donation to the work that you are doing in SA ........ search Amazon ...... if you are price sensitive they usually have good used copies.

Amy - Good luck with your work - post a link to your web site if you have one
 
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Hi Amy,

I normally use:
Newman’s Birds of Southern Africa
Sasol Birds of Southern Africa (4th edition)
Southern African LBJ’s Made Simple with CD (I am one of the authors)
500 Common Bird Calls with CD
Southern African Mammals Made Simple (also one of the authors)
Sounds of the African Bush with CD (also one of the authors)

If you have access to a smart phone or tablet (iPad) you can also get Sasol and Newman's as apps.

Then there is also the SAPPI Birds of South Africa book that has just come out.

Personally I would rather show the children the full diversity of birds by using the full guides so that they are aware that there are many different species out there... our LBJ's book and various raptor books are obviously more specialised.

Hope that helps and hope you enjoy a beautiful part of South Africa!

Cheers,
Gordon
 
Just spotted this so a belated warm welcome to Birdforum from staff and moderators.:t:

Glad to see that you've already got some excellent advice there.
 
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