A Brief Summary of my Collection

I've been collecting bird stamps since about 1970. I collect only those stamps that show birds found in the country of issue. My collection is arranged by species, following the order used in A Complete Checklist of Birds of the World by Richard Howard and Alick Moore (1^st edition, Oxford University Press, 1980). Before that book was issued, I followed the part work series called Birds of the World edited by John Gooders and published in the 1970s by IPC.

When I had a paper-based collection, I used to place a distribution map centrally on each page, and arrange the stamps around it, linking each to its country. I restrict my collection to only one example of each species from a country except for endemics. For these I collect whatever comes my way.

The distribution maps are copied from books about birds from most parts of the world, and from several that have recently been issued covering families of birds. I also use maps published by BirdLife International

My collection comprises about 17,300 stamps showing about 3400 species. (Figures updated January 2013)

I have placed the whole of my collection on this web site, together with news of new issues, and discussions about the identification of some species on stamps.

The publication of Clements' Checklist of the Birds of the World, 5th edition early in 2000 gave me the opportunity to revise my entire collection in the light of recent developments in avian taxonomy. I have added a Clements species code to my stamps data which enables me to view the collection in the new order, but to retain the Howard and Moore list.

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