On the Study of African Mammalia

Abstract

As Meester (1954) very rightly points out, we have not yet by any means completed the “exploration and cataloguing stage” as far as African mammals are concerned. In the course of some years study of the Northern Rhodesian mammal fauna it has become increasingly apparent how very much more there still is to learn, both in regard to taxonomy and distribution, to say nothing of ecology, which as yet can hardly be said even to be in its infancy in central Africa. Skead (1955) draws attention to the need for an organised zoological survey in Southern Africa, and understandably deplores the fact that the financing of past collecting expeditions has often had to depend on the generosity of private individuals.