Axel W. Erikssons African Bird Collection at Vänersborg Museum

Birds in Axel W. Eriksson collection was collected in South-Western Africa during 1867-1887. The birds are mainly collected by Axel W. Eriksson himself, with the exception of a few specimens collected by Charles John Andersson. The geographical range of the collection includes present-day Namibia, Angola, South Africa and Botswana. Eriksson's operations took place at the Omaruru trading station in central Namibia, which he established in 1869. From Omaruru, a large number of trade expeditions took place in the 1870s and 80s, a trade that mainly comprised of weapons, ivory, ostrich feathers and cattle. Most of the zoological collections were carried out during these trade expeditions. The collected material was stored in Omaruru in special magazines designed to withstand damage from e.g. insects before being transferred to Vänersborg's museum. Although birds dominate Eriksson's zoological collections, they also include bird eggs, mammals and insects. The collection presented in this dataset contains around 1000 birds. During the time of collection, Axel W Eriksson labeled each bird with its Latin name, the color of the bird's eyes, sex, location and date of collection. The extensive bird collection, of great importance for the founding and establishment of Vänersborg museum, was donated to the city of Vänersborg in 1883 by Axel Eriksson. It was mounted by the renowned taxidermist Gustav Kolthoff (1845-1913). Zoological collections from Eriksson have also been donated to the South African Museum in Cape Town, the British Museum of Natural History in London, Swedish Museum of Natural History, Gothenburg Museum of Natural History and the Universities of Lund and Uppsala.