SARBN: Southern African bird checklist version 11

[Trevor Hardaker]

Hello all SARBN subscribers,

 

It’s hard to believe that ver 10 of the Southern African bird checklist was published back in December 2020 and I haven’t published an update since then!! Sorry about that – time has just disappeared without me realising it. But, nevertheless, fresh after the latest world list update from the IOC (ver 12.2), please find attached the new and updated Southern African bird checklist for you to have a look at (ver 11).

 

All the changes have been noted on the tab labelled “changes” at the bottom of the spreadsheet, but here is a quick overview of some of them:

 

·         African Reed Warbler and Eurasian Reed Warbler have now been lumped as Common Reed Warbler. We lose one species on the subregion checklist because of this.

·         Western Osprey and Eastern Osprey have now been lumped back just as Osprey. It doesn’t affect our species count, only the common name of the bird.

·         The following new species have been added to the Southern African list:

-          Laughing Gull – the well twitched individual in Mossel Bay.

-          Crested Honey Buzzard – the well twitched individual in Somerset West, plus an additional 2 records in Grahamstown and George subsequent to that.

-          Green Warbler – the bird seen and sound recorded at Scarborough.

-          Wood Warbler – the well twitched bird at Phalaborwa.

-          Lesser Whitethroat – the well twitched bird at Marloth Park.

-          Common Diving Petrel – a dead bird found on the beach in Milnerton.

-          Mascarene Petrel – research showing satellite tracked individuals in southern Mozambique and KZN waters.

·         A number of other changes to common names in line with the latest IOC list and also taxonomical changes e.g. changes in the order of families, changes to genera, etc to be in line with IOC.

 

The upshot of all of this is that the current count for the Southern African subregion is now at 990 species. Just 10 more species to go before we hit the BIG ONE…!!!

 

Please work through the latest checklist and let me know if you pick up any errors in it. This will also now be the correct checklist to use to for counting up all your various listing club totals that are hosted on www.zestforbirds.co.za.

 

I hope you find it of some use. Enjoy the listing…J

 

Kind regards

Trevor