5 April 2026

Book Review: Habitats of Australia, New Guinea & The Solomons

Habitats of Australia: A Field Guide for Birders, Naturalists, and Ecologists, by Iain Campbell, Charley Hesse and Phil Gregory, covers every major habit on the Australian continent along with those in New Guinea and the Solomons. It’s another book in the Princeton University habitats series (I reviewed their excellent Africa habitats book a year ago).

As I said in that review, it pains me to admit this, but birders have understood much longer than I have the importance of using habitat to search for particular species. When it comes to targeting mammals I have tended to rely on range maps (usually very crude) and previous records. This can work well enough for larger species but for smaller mammals in particular there is often a very large gap in knowledge about where species occur, simply because no survey work has been done. So range maps – often constructed as a dot to dot from a handful of widely dispersed records – can be next to useless.

I’m still pained to admit that. But this book again provides an opportunity to to learn and work through my pain.

As the foreword to this book notes there are many lenses through which habitats can be classified: geological, geographic and botanical for instance. But, in this book, the authors partition the Australasia landscape by looking at bird (and to a lesser extent) mammal assemblages in conjunction with botany. And it’s a lens that works for me.

The book covers around 70 distinct types of natural habitat, and is full of pictures of the landscape and the birds (plus a few of the mammals) that you might find in each. So if you are heading down under this will be a useful resource to help plan your trip and understand a bit more about the areas you find yourself in.

Habitats of Australia: A Field Guide for Birders, Naturalists, and Ecologists, by Iain Campbell, Charley Hesse and Phil Gregory is available from Princeton University Press and elsewhere.

Jon

 

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Jon Hall
Genetically Welsh, spiritually Australian, currently in New York City. I’ve also lived and worked in London, Canberra, Paris and Lusaka, and watched mammals in over 100 countries.
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