AFRICAN INSECT LIFE [1953]

Publisher's black cloth hardcover binding with illustrated dust jacket.

387pp. Illustrated.

Binding sound. Contents clean. Dust jacket with age-associated wear and chipping.

Sydney Harold Skaife (1889 - 1976) was an eminent South African entomologist and naturalist. His career and educational publications covered a wide field. Especially in his later years his main research interest was in social insects and the transitional phases in sociality, particularly in the Hymenoptera (bees, wasps etc.) and Isoptera (termites).

Born in England and moving to South Africa as a young adult, he soon mastered the Afrikaans language to such an extent that he was able to write several Afrikaans detective novels, featuring his character Adriaan Hugo (using the pseudonym Hendrik Brand), which proved very popular among the Afrikaner youth.