Sasol Ebirds App Reviews

An excellent app and so much more useful and user friendly since it was made available for the iPhone and iPad. I have tried to use this app since it was originally launched in digital format and always had incredible problems until the iPhone version was brought out. Now I am never without it. I hope the Kruger and Frog versions come out soon.

Great app, no complaints works well. Used on recent Kruger trip. Suggestion, any chance of multiple bird lists?

Do not buy this ebook. It doesn't contain even many of the common SA birds. Buy the book.

This is an excellent application. Finding birds by group or name is fast and easy. The calls are clear and easy to hear without earphones or earbuds. Our guide in South Africa wants one too!

$30 is one fifth of the price of the Ipaq version that i bought a few years ago. App apears to be stable - no crashes as yet. The Sasol database and illustrations = comprehensive and accurate. Advanced search function allows you to narrow bird list for your geographic region and surrounding environment and call up birds with sound clips. Finding birds much easier than with hard copy book version. Great to have birds in my pocket 24/7.

Would be good to see which birds are already ticked in the main list. I'm just waiting for Birds of SubSaharan Africa to join your app line up. Also any chance to use the calls for iPhone rings, message alerts etc??

The number of birds available on the iPad 'version' is way short of those on the iPhone. This ought not to be the case because it is the same app. Seems it has a problem.

Useful however I would like to be able to save vocalizations to use on another quiz app.

Having downloaded to my iPad all I can say is : Very disappointing.Minimum info and no sonogram as advertised. Compared to opposition ebook I bought for my PDA some 8 years ago this is pathetic.Waste of money.

Extremely useful field guide and recording of bird list. Also very useful to hear and ID birds by sounds. New dev is also welcome such as last sightings. Actual photos of specimens would be a nice addition at some point.

Although initially costly, this is a superb app. It's easier to use than the book and is always updated, even when totally new editions of the book come out. The bird calls that can be played are a feature the book can't replicate - I have even found birds with it when I thought I heard one in the field, I played the call, and the bird responded allowing me to find it. I love the fact I can have it on both my iPhone and iPad -- whichever I happen to have with me. An incredible enhancement with the latest update is the location function that works automatically and only displays birds that are known to be in the geographic area you are in. I only have 2 wishes: (1) The personal lists would be better if you could sync them between devices (like calendar, etc.or linked to iCloud); (2) Imagine if the app could record a bird sound and then identify the bird. The technology exists and is there for music (a la Shazam) so it seems to be a matter of applying it to the bird sounds that are already in the eBirds app. Well done and thanks for a great app for beginner and advanced birders alike.

This app has been quite a disappointment, simply because there are so many species of birds missing from the app. I would not recommend buying this until the number of birds included is much higher. It is frustrating to see a relatively common bird and not find it in this app. It is far too expensive for what is offered. Go buy a bird ID book instead!

The Sasol eBirds of Southern Africa is my first birding software experience. I am brand new to the iPod as well. I found that the eBird software was far easier to learn, operate and grow procient in than getting into the iTunes store and buying this software. I used the software in Limpopo Province, South Africa. It is a great application. I found it best when i knew something of the bird, say a startling or a hawk and could start my search with a name. That proved really valuable and I was able to quickly locate the specific species. I did not find as much success with the "Smart Search" using beack type, size and habitat. Perhaps with more practice that will work but I had very little luck in identify birds using that method. I did not isolate my searches by "My Location" until half-way through the day. At that point by narrowing down to a Provincial Location, i narrowed the search possiblilites by quite a bit - making identification quicker and easier. I really like the ease of adding the bird to my list once I had located it. Since I am new to iPod I had trouble with the sound and the bird calls were bearly audible on the 3G speaker. Perhaps that can be resolved as I learn more. I have only had one use with this new system and software but I am hooked. Sasol eBird has my best recommendation. al york

Still a lot of work to do to make this a good app. There are a lot of bugs. The Smart Search is flawed, and I'm sure the sound for a Bateleur is not the one they have on file! This app has so much potential, but it still needs a LOT of work. The creator also needs to realize that this is an ipod/iphone/ipad app. - not just digitizing a book onto a portable device. What about including a quiz to build up your identification skills? How about using the other features and capabilities of the device? Also, a simple day of work would mean you can check accuracy against the book. Definitely not worth the price charged. I hope we see some BIG improvements in later versions.

It is a fantastic book too enhance your field guiding career but the r some weavers missing such as sociable weaver and buffalo weavers but amazing .ps for the new update u should let us be able to take photos and be able to put it in a booklet in the app

Thanks for very good, practical iPad version.

Enjoy using the app, but some of the colouring not entirely accurate and it would be great if one could identify the birds by recording their call and then searching - not always easy to spot the bird, but often we hear it. Any chance of that happening?

I have not been to Africa yet, but the app certainly seems worth the money. Range maps are clear, voice and song recordings are fine. No actual photos that I have found but the illustrations are good. The "smart search" option is clever and worth exploring. This app is not up to the quality of iBird Pro (North Am), but quite nice and much better than traveling with heavy and bulky books.

Just returned from my first trip to S Africa where I totally relied on this. Worked perfectly. You need to learn the families to use well, just like the book. A few birds mis-located-- range map correct but they are absent from a key provincial list.

App itself is not bad but if you need support, you’re out of luck. Absolutely no response to emails (too far away to call). Another case of ‘You bought it sucker. Now you’re on your own’.

I reloaded this for another trip to Africa, and all the lists are overlapping, so I can’t open anything

Stop removing the birds with your updates. The book is worth more if this continues

The complete book is here, searchable and browsable. The bird sounds are a nice bonus.

Very disappointing! Used the app on our recent visit to Kruger Park and was unable to pick up a number of birds sighted. In particular I was unable to pick up the Bateleur which I find amazing - there are only 11 eagles listed in the app.

The new version states that you can go from "my list" directly to bird information. If you can, I have not figured out how. It also states you can export your list and again, I have not figured out how. If I could see those changes it would be an even better program, but I find no differences. So I like it still, but am sad I can find no differences. Maybe its just me. Update, newer version was pushed out 8 hours later and the changes are now in place. The sofrware has now improved.

If you are looking for a bird guide for Southern Africa, this is the one. With the new updates, searching and identification is a breeze.

Photos for some very common birds not available, the South African Shelduck is one example!!!

quite happy with app. should bring in a way of indicating which birds on main list has already been 'ticked'. also quick search by picture instead of name.

Great App, especially if you add the photos to it. Still too many birds missing though

I just returned from a once in a lifetime trip to South Africa. I saw 458 birds during the 3 weeks I spent there. 78 of them were not included in the program, almost 20%. I found that pretty amazing - they offer a very complete listing in their print edition, they had to go out of their way to omit birds during their transition to software. Entire families were missing — there are no seabirds of any kind - no Albatross, no Petrals, no Skuas, no Shearwaters, no Storm Petrals or Fulmars and only 3 Terns and 1 Gull. The program is worthless along the coast or off shore. In addition, many of the common names were out of date. The most amazing omission is that there are no Rock-jumpers, South Africa's best known bird and the one people go to there to see. One of the main reasons I bought this application was for the bird calls. They worked for 3 days. I was not able to restore this feature during the remainder of the trip. Missing birds and no bird calls are show stoppers. My other complaints were just irritating. If you use the listing function, you will discover there is no way to edit place names. If you discover that you made a spelling error in the 25 birds you saw "En route Hluhluwe We-umfolozi" and try to edit the location you are presented with a blank space and offered the opportunity to type the whole thing over again just to correct 1 letter — and you get to do this for each of the 25 birds you saw. You are not given the opportunity to just change the incorrect letter, there is no global search and replace function, no ability to copy and paste - nada. Just retype the same thing 25 times. Even if you notice a mistake while typing an entry, you can't correct it without deleting everything you typed after the error. You can't just insert or move the cursor to the offending letter. Sasol is making an effort to provide applications of a lot of the World's birding locations, which is admirable, but based on this one experience, they are a long way from producing a useable application. I would be hesitant to buy any of them on iTunes because of their no returns / no refunds policy.

I have the book and this version does not include all the birds. For the same price as the hard copy, I expected more. Could you update the app or explain why you make it sound like it is the same as the 4th ed book, when it is not?

This was a very dissapointing purchase. There are several bug and no updates have happened since its last release in January. The bird calls are of poor quality- too much background noise. You can not save your list to an external source- lose phone lose list! If you do a search for eg. hornbill- you can not scroll past the fist 3 and select. Not compatible with Ipad? I received notification today that Birdlife SA will be releasing a Roberts version in the next couple of months. This will also be for Ipads and there PDA versions have been excellent in the past.

Terrific - very useful in the field. So much info in such a small package! (I'm a veteran of 24 years international birding)

The information is fairly extensive but the screen shot is iPhone size and makes reading on an iPad frustrating. This significantly diminishes the experience.

Awesome app. Saves me from carrying my book everywhere I go. Would just like to see an added feature added to the my list. When clicking on a specific bird in your personal list could it show the bird and not just the name?

This is definitely one of the best apps ever!

Do not purchase if you want bird calls as the bird call feature did not work at all on my iPhone 3gs. Reinstalling and rebooting did not help either. I emailed the developers twice asking for assistance and they still have not responded more than a week later. Apple immediately assisted me and hv refunded me so a big thank you to Apple but a big vote of NO to this app and to it's developers.

I've never paid so much for an app, but the portability and interactive features of this guide are wonderful. Even though im now home from safari, looking through this book reminds me of wonderful sightings, and I am not a bird person! How I wish they had an iPad app! The Kindle version is just the print copy in electronic form.

I have this app on my iPhone when I am on safari in southern Africa. It is fast, accurate, and the photo pack really helps to nail down the identification of a bird. Having the ability to build a list of sightings by date is a big help in being able to keyword my photos when I get home.