Birders tend to prefer the summer months, when everything is singing, breeding and displaying. However, during South Africa's precious short winter months our 'resident' bird species undergo a remarkable shift in distribution. This is evident even in your own garden! Here are some of the more interesting changes I've noticed over the last few chilly weeks...

In this second Harry Potter-themed review of Lynx Edicions and BirdLife International's collaborative Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World (Volume 1, Non-passerines) I'll give you some more specifics on the book's layout and content. In addition, I reveal some of the more shocking findings of the book's taxonomic research team - and how these lumps and splits will affect us Muggles and our lifelists. Oh, and there's some Dumbledore quotes.

Do you believe in magic? After reviewing Lynx Edicions and BirdLife International's collaborative Illustrated Checklist of the Birds of the World (Volume 1, Non-passerines), I certainly do. How else do you manage to include an illustration, distribution map and a taxonomic review to subspecies-level for almost 4,500 species into one book? In the first of this two-part review, I summarise the taxonomic concepts behind this magical publication.