Steve Parish Publishing

The complete list of 2010 Whitley Award Winners can be seen here: 

2010 Whitley Awards
The Royal Zoological Society of NSW today announced the winners of the 2010 Whitley Awards. The awards are for outstanding publications dealing with the promotion and conservation of Australasian fauna. Of the awards, the Whitley Medal is the most sought after prize in Australian zoological publishing.

The Whitley Awards, first presented in 1979, are hosted by the Royal Zoological Society of NSW and presented at a ceremony at The Australian Museum in Sydney. They are a tribute to Gilbert Whitley (1903-1975), who was the Curator of Fishes at the Australian Museum from 1922 to 1964. For many years, Whitley was also the editor of the Society's publications and a very active member of council.

This year’s Whitley Medal winner is:
A Guide to the Beetles of Australia by George Hangay and Paul Zborowski, CSIRO Publishing.
The book follows the very successful format of previous CSIRO insect guidebooks: dragonflies, katydids, moths and butterflies. They are designed to bridge the gap between popular natural history and academic treatise. But this latest book leaves the others for dead in the daunting scope of the project. While insects make up 75% of animal species on Earth, over 40% of insects are beetles. About 20 000 species of beetles have been described from Australia, which in reality represents only the tip of the iceberg. The earlier chapters deal with the distinguishing features of beetles, beetle anatomy, physiology, reproduction and development. The diversity sections covers over 80% of the families of beetles found in Australia. While both authors are based in Australia, they have studied insects from many parts of the world and hence can put the Australian fauna into a world context. The text is beautifully illustrated by numerous high-quality photographs, most of which were taken by Paul Zborowski. Paul is also the co-author of the Whitley Medal winning Field Guide to Insects of Australia.

The Awards also include Certificates of Commendation and this year these were awarded to the following 14 publications:

Children’s Story
Journey of the sea turtle by Mark Wilson: Lothian Children’s Books.

Children’s Educational Series
The secret life of caterpillars and All about ants by Densey Clyne: Young Reed, an imprint of New Holland.

Field Guide
Field guide to sea stingers and other venomous and poisonous marine invertebrates of Western Australia by Loisette Marsh and Shirley Slack-Smith: Western Australian Museum Press.

Regional Guide
Where to see birds in Victoria edited by Tim Dolby, Penny Johns and Sally Symonds: Birds Australia and Jacana Books (Allen & Unwin).

Popular Zoology
Australian Wildlife – unique and unusual by Karin Cox, photographs by Steve Parish: Steve Parish Publishing.

Urban Zoology
The possum-trail tree: understanding possums through citizen science by Philip Roetman and Christopher Daniels, illustrated by Ross Bateup: Barbara Hardy Centre for sustainable Urban Environments, University of SA.

Interactive Resource
Redmap by Gretta Pecl (project leader): Tasmanian Aquaculture & Fisheries Institute (University of Tasmania).

Environmental Zoology
At the end of the river: the Coorong and Lower Lakes by David Paton: .Australian Theological Forum Ltd Press.

Conservation Zoology
Amazing facts about Australian Wildlife Conservation by Karin Cox, photographs by Steve Parish: Steve Parish Publishing.

Zoological text
Forest pattern and ecological process by David Lindenmayer: CSIRO Publishing.

Periodical
Australian age of dinosaurs edited by David Elliott: Annual publication of Australian Age of Dinosaurs Museum of Natural History Issue 7.

Pocket Guide
A Wild Australia Guide: Bats by Les Hall: Steve Parish Publishing.

Natural History
Fishes of the open ocean: a natural history and illustrated guide by Julian Pepperell, illustrated by Guy Harvey: University of NSW Press.

Zoological Resource
Pathology of Australian native wildlife by Philip Ladds: CSIRO Publishing.

Special Commendation
A significant feature of this year’s Award Ceremony was the presentation of a Special Commendation to Steve Parish. In 2003, the Royal Zoological Society NSW instigated this very prestigious award to acknowledge outstanding contributions to the promotion of Australasian fauna and its conservation through publishing. Although the awarding is long overdue, it is very timely in one sense as it coincides with the 50th anniversary of Steve’s launch into the world of nature photography. While Steve could not be present at the ceremony, Karin Cox, who has supplied the text to accompany many of Steve Parish publications, accepted the Certificate on his behalf.

For more information contact
Dr Noel Tait, Chairman, Whitley Awards Committee, RZS NSW 
phone/fax: 612 9427 6747; mobile: 0419 4119 67; email: noelrobyn@bigpond.co