Ruth Matthews began recording The Courier’s birth notices after welcoming her first son into the world in 1965 and has seen the newborn names come and go over five decades. 

“There’s a whole lot of different names, some of the older names are coming back this year,” Ms Matthews said.

However, Ms Matthews said birth notices had declined rapidly in the past few years, noting 400 less notices since 2011.

“They’ve dropped off and off because people post it on Facebook now instead,” she said.

The grandmother said she took a traditional approach to naming her four sons Rodney, Neville, Colin and Gary.

She noted some of the more unusual names of 2013 were Jensen, Jonty, Blade, Euphemia, McKenna and Luna.

Ms Matthews work has been consistent for 48 years and said she would consider “retiring” at the half century, or maybe not.

“While on holidays I have to get someone to keep the copies of the paper. It’s just I’ve done it for so long I don’t want to stop now,” she said.

“I just enjoy doing it and seeing new names come up. Some people seem to think it’s interesting, the names change every year.”

Her statistics show that sets of twins tend to vary, with 11 sets of twins recorded last year, compared to 33 in 2007.

Most popular baby names 2013

Boys

1. Jack / Jackson, 18

2. Tom / Thomas, 12

3. Hudson or William, 10 each

4. Cooper, 9

5. Harrison / Harry or Henry, 8 each

Girls

1. Charlotte or Ruby, 11 each

2. Emily, 8

3. Ella, 7

4. Annabelle, Esabelle, Mila, Mia or Sophie, 6 each

5. Ava, Isabella, Indianna, Matilda or Maddison, 5 each