African Wildlife & Environment Issue 78

GOOD READS

GOOD READS Book reviews by Dr John Ledger

information gleaned at each of the three stages. First is to recognise the characteristics of the family, then of the relevant visual group within that family, and finally the key pointers that distinguish the species which are only relevant within the specific visual group. There is a bar code with every species description and when you scan that with your smart phone, the call of the species will play.You do not need to be within cell phone tower range, as the calls are stored on the app itself. It is all fiendishly clever and something that my generation would never have dreamed possible. Doug is an electrical engineer by trade who has applied his talents to birds and their calls. Gordon is an IT specialist, specifically in data methodology. Between them they have published a number of works and they are the co-founders of the Simply Birding website, which you can visit at www. simplybirding.com. Thank you gentlemen for this wonderful book, which is Simply Splendid!

Little Brown Jobs Newman, Doug & Gordon King (2021). Southern African LBJs made simple . Second edition. Struik Nature, an imprint of Penguin Random House South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Cape Town. Soft cover, 15x21 cm, 152 pp, illustrated in colour throughout with photographs and diagrams. ISBN 978-1-77584 -652-6. R267. First published in 2011, this new updated, expanded and 'wired for sound' book will be wanted by every birder! Why? Because the LBJs are the most difficult and frustrating birds to identify accurately, and anything that will help meet this challenge is both desirable and necessary, to deal with the birder's mental anguish of not being sure of what species it was you saw on your last birding sortie. We've all been there: you get a good look at the bird, hear its call and then you come home and start browsing your books. Sadly, you are not quite sure if it had a stripe above the eye, bars on its tail, or whether it went "chick-chick-chick" or "zit-zit-zit". Oh dear…not again… Messrs Newman and King have provided the antidote to this miserable dilemma. If you use this book properly and follow their advice, you will be spared the embarrassment of LBJ fatigue.With this book in hand, and with your smart phone charged up and with the Struik free app installed, you will be ready to take on any LBJ challenge. The authors present a tested methodology that, if followed scrupulously, will guide you to the correct identification of the LBJ in question. They stress that the process is cumulative, building on

Bats Stuart, Chris & Mathilde (2021). Flying mammals – Quick ID guide to the bats of Africa. Struik Nature, an imprint of Penguin Random House South Africa (Pty) Ltd, Cape Town. Soft cover, 10x18 cm, 40 pp, illustrated in colour throughout with photographs and diagrams. ISBN 978-1-77584 -728-1. R83. The Quick ID series are small books of 40 pages designed to fit in a pocket or a small backpack. Twenty percent of all mammals are bats. At least 259 species occur in Africa: 230 insect-eating bats and 29 fruit-eating bats, two of which are restricted to Indian Ocean islands.

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