Best Catalog To Use For Irish Stamps?

I'm starting to collect Irish stamps. I live in the US. What is the best catalog to use? I can buy the Scott 2013 Ireland section of the catalog on my iPad. Or I can buy the section I need from the Scott catalog on paper off of ebay.

But I am wonder if I should be using the Hibernian Catalog, or Stanley Gibbons Ireland? Does anyone know what the primary catalog is that collectors in Ireland use?

IMHO I would use the 1. Stanley Gibbons or the 2. Hibernian or third choice by rank Scott, of course this depends on where you get your stamps from.

Well, I've been looking at ebay and it seems almost all ebay auctions for Irish stamps use Stanley Gibbons numbers, so I'm thinking that may be the way to go.

To best honest, I am not sure where the best place to obtain stamps is. Right now, I have only gotten stamps from SCF members and anpost directly.

I too prefer the Hibernian Catalogue. This one lists a lot of the plate varieties of both commemoratives and definitive stamps.

Chimo

Bujutsu

What numbering system does Hibernian use?

It appears that they use their own system of numbers. I tried pairing a few stamps from the Scott Catalogue and none of the numbers matched.

The good thing is that all the stamps are illustrated in colour and should not be too hard to locate.

Hope this helps

Chimo

Bujutsu

I wonder if they pair up with Stanley Gibbons.

Hibernian just confirmed via email that they use their own numbering system. Sadly I have never seen single listing anywhere that references a Hibernian number. So, I think Stanly Gibbons might be the way to go...

apas,
I think you would find Stanley Gibbons the most accurate. Simply because it is geographically the closest to the nation you are collecting.
Bear - YorkStCb.

I have a question to ask, because I do not have a Gibbons for Ireland, and that is, does Gibbons lists the varieties like the Hibernian catalogue?

I have a Hibernian Catalogue for 2002 and find it easy to use. so, I am just wondering out of curiosity.

Chimo

Bujutsu

I don't know. The Gibbons Ireland catalog is not available via their iOS app, otherwise I would have bought it already.

Hi Bujutsu,

I don't have either I'm afraid, but I'd expect the SG Ireland catalogue to have the same level of detail as the SG Part 1 (Commonwealth & British Empire) catalogue. In fact for the issues up until 1970 I'd expect the listings to be exactly the same.

SG publish their Ireland catalogue in two versions, one priced in pounds and the other in euros.

There's another catalog no one's mentioned, but I'm not sure it's still published: MacDonnell-Whyte Specialized Catalogue of Ireland. For every stamp, it shows 5 catalog numbers, side by side: Gibbons, Scott, Michel, Yvert, and David Feldman. It also includes postal stationery, some of which is exceedingly rare, but usually totally unrecognized by dealers. Best of all, it illustrates and prices a zillion flyspeck varieties.

I agree with doug2222, but unfortunately, the MW catalogue hasn't been produced since 1991. You might get one on abebooks.com, but it's a long shot.

Interesting

I sure would love to get a copy of M-W catalogue.

Chimo

Bujutsu

My Pennyworth is,
Get the Commonwealth Stanley Gibbons, as it also contains many other countries and thus has the best perceived value.
600 pages and heavily discounted if you are prepared to get last years or the years before.
Yuri-YSC.
p.s. MacDonnell-Whyte is as good as Doug says, but just try and get hold of one!