James Kitching Award

Awarded for service to South African palaeontology (Aulacephalodon maquette)

• 2006 - ​Charles Brain
• 2008 - Charles Brain

Australopithecus Award

Awarded for the best paper on a Cenozoic subject (instituted by Francis Thackeray)

• 2024 - Justin Bradfield

Bob and Laura Brain Award

Awarded for the most "Fun with Fossils"

• 2004 - Rose Adendorff
• 2006 - Merrill Nicolas and Robert Gess
• 2008 - Christine Steininger
• 2010 - Robert Gess
• 2012 - Alex Parkinson and Sifelani Jirah
• 2014 - Pia Vigliette and Cameron Penn-Clark
• 2016 - 
• 2018 - Students of the PEATS group at the Albany Museum: Liaam Davids, Rebecca Cawood, Ekhpna Zozo, Ben Kirkaldy, Alex Holland, and Sydney Moyo
• 2022 - Derik Wolvaardt
• 2024 - Andrew Bolton

Harrismith Mug

Awarded for best paper at conference

• 2002 - Rose Adendorff - Hirsutum intermittens: A re-interpretation of an enigmatic ovulate glossopterid fructification
• 2004 - No award
• 2006 - Thomas Lehmann - Distribution of Tubulidentata species and their relationships with early hominids
• 2008 - Roger Smith - Vertebrate taphonomy and ichnology of a Permin "wet desert" in central Pangea
• 2010 - Sandra Jasinoski - Cranial suture morphology and its implications for skull function in therapsids
• 2012 - Tyler Lyson - Evolutionary developmental model for the origin of the turtle shell and a novel functional hypothesis for the origin of the chelonian lung ventilation mechanism
• 2014 - Tyler Faith - Rusingoryx atopocranion (Artiodactyla: Bovidae) and the non-analogue ecosystems of modern human origins in East Africa
• 2016 - 
• 2018 - Julien Benoit
• 2022 - Miengah Abrahams
• 2024 - Marc van den Brandt

Order of the Boot

Awarded for the most unbelievable presentation, even though it may be the brilliant truth (instituted by Dr Jacques van Heerden)

• ​1979 - Burger Oelofsen - Fishy fossils
• 1982 - Burger Oelofsen
• 1984 - Eva Kovacs - Endrody - 'The earliest known vascular plant ...', which she named Promissum pulchrum
• 1986 - Roger Smith - Diictodon and the Devil's Corkskrew!
• 1988 - Norton Hiller - Lower Devonian hyoliths in SA and their palaeoenvironmental significance
• 1990 - Francis Thackeray - for determining daily growth increments in Diictodon teeth
• 1992 - Dick Rayner - Species in the fossil record
• 1994 - Tom Mason - Trace fossil?
• 1996 - John Anderson - for quantifying Molteno plant diversity based on the number of specimens which he has not yet found
• 1998 - Barry Millsteed - for shooting all previous workers in SA palynology down in flames - including himself!
• 2000 - Darryl de Ruiter - for building hominids from teeth fragments
• 2002 - Francis Thackeray - for having Mrs Ples's skull at a different stratigraphic level than the skeleton
• 2004 - Francois Durand - for having a sidewinder in the Cretaceous
• 2006 - Eric Harley - for converting genetics into lies, damn lies and statistics
• 2008 - Francis Thackeray
• 2010 - Robert Gess - for having fishy sample sizes
• 2012 - Brigette Cohen - for the origins of alcoholism
• 2014 - Alexander Parkinson - for systematically disproving his own research in 15 minutes!
• 2016 - 
• 2018 - Marco Romano - for supporting the ridiculous reconstructions of tiny-headed Caseids!
• 2022 - Michael Day
• 2024 - Julien Benoit

Lystrosaurus Cast

Awarded for best poster of the conference

• 1988 - Gideon Groenewald - Palaeontology of the North East Orange Free State
• 1990 - Patrick Bender and James Brink
• 1992 - William de Klerk, Michael Raath and Norton Hiller - The First South African Dinosaur?
• 1994 - Robert Gess - Devonian plant and fish fossil from Grahamstown
• 1996 - William de Klerk, Cathy Forster and Callum Ross - Lower Cretaceous Kirkwood dinosaurs
• 1998 - Roger Smith - Bone-bearing coprolites of the Karoo
• 2000 - Eddie van Dijk - for his very high standard in four posters
• 2002 - J.H. van den Worm and Jurie van den Heever - Pleiocene lizards from the West Coast Fossil Park
• 2004 - Robert Gess - A large cyrtoctenid eurypterid from a Witpoort Formation (Upper Devonian, Famennian) exposure near Grahamstown in the Eastern Cape
• 2006 - Marc Blackbeard - Taphonomy of an early Jurassic dinosaur bone-bed, Free State
• 2008 - Maria Ovechkina, Mike Watkeys and Warren Kretzinger - Calcareous nannofossils from the stratotype section of the Santonian-Campanian Mzamba Formation, Eastern Cape, South Africa
• 2010 - Alicia Kennedy, B.-A. S. Bhullar, P. J. Lewis and M. L. Thies – A preliminary analysis of a Plio-Pleistocene herpetofauna from Botswana
• 2012 - Ashley Kruger, Bruce Rubidge and Fernando Abdala - A redescription of a burnetiamorph (Therapsida, Biarmosuchia) from Karoo rocks of Malawi
• 2014 - Mhairi Reid - Invertebrate taphonomy and sedimentology of the Devonian Voorstehoek Formation (Ceres Subgroup, Bokkeveld Group, Cape Supergroup), Western Cape
• 2016 - German Montoya
• 2018 - Sandy Lennox
• 2022 - Enele Twala
• 2024 - Yulia Suchkova

Lystrosaurus Shield

Awarded ​for best student paper

• 1988 - Anusuya Chinsamy - Palaeohistology of Syntarsus
• 1990 - Pascal Chesselet - Identification of conodonts
• 1992 - Lee Berger - Gladysvale hominids
• 1994 - Lyndsey Firm - Therocephalians
• 1996 - Elizabeth Latimer - Rhinesuchid amphibians
• 1998 - Alain Renaut - Dicynodont masticatory mechanisms reconsidered
• 2000 - Lucinda Blackwell - Bone tool use and the identification of early homonid cultural traditions, new data from Swartkrans and Sterkfontein
• 2002 - Robyn Pickering - Cave stratigraphy
• 2004 - Juan Cisneros - Evolutionary trends in owenettid procolophonoids
• 2006 - Sandra Jasinoski - Cranial mechanics of Dicynodontia
• 2008 - Philip Mannion - Sauropod dinosaurs of Africa
• 2010 - Shahed Nalla - The hominin first rib
• 2012 - Lara Sciscio - Fluctuating Miocene climates and ecosystems at the southern tip of Africa: a multiproxy approach
• 2014 - Ashley Kruger - Ontogeny and cranial morphology of the basal carnivorous dinocephalians 
• 2016 - 
• 2018 - Kimberley Chapelle
• 2022 - Howard Head
• 2024 - Caitlin Rabe