diff --git a/Documentation/source/site-specific-config.rst b/Documentation/source/site-specific-config.rst
index b7481c08..9faaeb04 100644
--- a/Documentation/source/site-specific-config.rst
+++ b/Documentation/source/site-specific-config.rst
@@ -20,7 +20,12 @@ contains all the tools that will be used during the build process, but
 it can only store one tool per category. If a certain tool should not
 be defined in the toolbox, the default from the `ToolRepository` will
 be used. This is useful for many standard tools like `git`, `rsync`
-etc that de-facto will never be changed.
+etc that de-facto will never be changed. Fab will check if a tool
+is actually available on the system before adding it to a ToolBox.
+This is typically done by trying to run the tool with some testing
+parameters, for example requesting its version number. If this fails,
+the tool is considered not to be available and will not be used (unless
+the user explicitly puts a tool into the ToolBox).
 
 .. note:: If you need to use for example different compilers for
           different files, you would implement this as a `meta-compiler`:
diff --git a/source/fab/tools/tool.py b/source/fab/tools/tool.py
index a870c657..78a8de62 100644
--- a/source/fab/tools/tool.py
+++ b/source/fab/tools/tool.py
@@ -63,8 +63,7 @@ def check_available(self) -> bool:
         :returns: whether the tool is working (True) or not.
         '''
         try:
-            op = self._availability_option
-            self.run(op)
+            self.run(self._availability_option)
         except (RuntimeError, FileNotFoundError):
             return False
         return True
diff --git a/source/fab/tools/tool_repository.py b/source/fab/tools/tool_repository.py
index 0a17d7e6..965e252b 100644
--- a/source/fab/tools/tool_repository.py
+++ b/source/fab/tools/tool_repository.py
@@ -75,7 +75,7 @@ def __init__(self):
         # Add the common shells. While Fab itself does not need this,
         # it is a very convenient tool for user configuration (e.g. to
         # query nc-config etc)
-        for shell_name in ["bash", "sh", "ksh", "dash"]:
+        for shell_name in ["sh", "bash", "ksh", "dash"]:
             self.add_tool(Shell(shell_name))
 
         # Now create the potential mpif90 and Cray ftn wrapper
@@ -174,6 +174,8 @@ def get_default(self, category: Category,
             OpenMP.
 
         :raises KeyError: if the category does not exist.
+        :raises RuntimeError: if no tool in the requested category is
+            available on the system.
         :raises RuntimeError: if no compiler/linker is found with the
             requested level of MPI support (yes or no).
         '''
diff --git a/tests/unit_tests/tools/test_shell.py b/tests/unit_tests/tools/test_shell.py
index 38ba8c71..deab54d4 100644
--- a/tests/unit_tests/tools/test_shell.py
+++ b/tests/unit_tests/tools/test_shell.py
@@ -39,11 +39,11 @@ def test_shell_check_available():
 
 def test_shell_exec_single_arg():
     '''Test running a shell script without additional parameters.'''
-    bash = Shell("ksh")
+    ksh = Shell("ksh")
     mock_result = mock.Mock(returncode=0)
     with mock.patch('fab.tools.tool.subprocess.run',
                     return_value=mock_result) as tool_run:
-        bash.exec("echo")
+        ksh.exec("echo")
     tool_run.assert_called_with(['ksh', '-c', 'echo'],
                                 capture_output=True, env=None, cwd=None,
                                 check=False)
@@ -51,11 +51,11 @@ def test_shell_exec_single_arg():
 
 def test_shell_exec_multiple_args():
     '''Test running a shell script with parameters.'''
-    bash = Shell("ksh")
+    ksh = Shell("ksh")
     mock_result = mock.Mock(returncode=0)
     with mock.patch('fab.tools.tool.subprocess.run',
                     return_value=mock_result) as tool_run:
-        bash.exec(["some", "shell", "function"])
+        ksh.exec(["some", "shell", "function"])
     tool_run.assert_called_with(['ksh', '-c', 'some', 'shell', 'function'],
                                 capture_output=True, env=None, cwd=None,
                                 check=False)