Osbert Salvin was an English naturalist, ornithologist and herpetologist, best known for co-authoring Biologia Centrali-Americana (1879-1915) with Frederick DuCane Godman. In 1871 Salvin became editor of The Ibis. He was appointed to the Strickland Curatorship in the University of Cambridge, and produced his Catalogue of the Strickland Collection. He was one of the original members of the British Ornithologists' Union. He produced the volumes on the Trochilidae and Procellariidae in the Catalogue of Birds in the British Museum. One of his last works was the completion of Lord Lilford's Coloured Figures of British Birds (1897). Salvin was a Fellow of the Royal Society, the Linnean, Entomogical and Zoological Society of London. At the time of his death he was Secretary of the British Ornithologists' Union.