William Richard John Dean: 10 August 1940 – 3 August 2022
In birding circles, Richard Dean is perhaps best known as an editor
of the seventh edition of Roberts Birds of Southern Africa, but he
was a prolific naturalist with a varied career in research and conservation.
In addition to writing more species accounts in Roberts
7 than any other author, he published more than 200 scientific
papers, co-compiled a bibliography of birds of Angola and wrote
Nomadic Desert Birds and Bird Collectors during the mid-19th to
mid-20th Centuries in Southern Africa. He also edited a synthesis
of research in the Karoo (with Sue Milton) and a farmers’ guide to
rangeland management (with Karen Esler and Sue Milton); served
as editor of Ostrich from 2000 until 2006; and was awarded the Gill
Memorial Medal for lifetime service to ornithology in southern Africa
in March 2009.