Robert Geoffrey Hewett "Bob" Green AM (4 November 1925 – 29 August 2013) was an Australian naturalist, photographer, conservationist, and long-term Curator of the

Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery The Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery (QVMAG) is a museum located in Launceston, Tasmania, Australia. The QVMAG is the largest museum in Australia not located in a capital city. History The foundation stone for the original building to ...

Launceston, Tasmania Launceston () or () is a city in the north of Tasmania, Australia, at the confluence of the North Esk and South Esk rivers where they become the Tamar River (kanamaluka). As of 2021, Launceston has a population of 87,645. Material was copied ...

Early years

Green was born in Launceston. He grew up on the family farm at Antill Ponds in the Tasmanian Midlands where he developed a strong interest in natural history. He joined the

Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union The Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union (RAOU), now part of BirdLife Australia, was Australia's largest non-government, non-profit, bird conservation organisation. It was founded in 1901 to promote the study and bird conservation, conservati ...

in 1946, took up

bird banding Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweig ...

and became the Tasmanian Regional Organiser of the

Australian Bird and Bat Banding Scheme The Australian Bird and Bat Banding Scheme (ABBBS), a combination of the former Australian bird banding and bat banding schemes, is managed by the Department of the Environment, Australia. History The earliest banding of wild birds for scientific ...

Queen Victoria Museum

In 1959 Green was appointed the honorary ornithologist at the Queen Victoria Museum, the start of a thirty-year association with the institution. In 1960 he sold the farm and joined the museum staff, becoming the permanent curator from 1962 to 1990. As well as building up the museum's collections of natural history and historical material, he also amassed a large personal collection of the eggs of Tasmanian birds, which was eventually donated to the

National Museum of Australia The National Museum of Australia, in the national capital Canberra, preserves and interprets Australia's social history, exploring the key issues, people and events that have shaped the nation. It was formally established by the ''National Muse ...

Canberra Canberra ( ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The ci ...

in 2002.

Achievements

Green published over 130

scientific paper : ''For a broader class of literature, see Academic publishing.'' Scientific literature comprises scholarly publications that report original empirical and theoretical work in the natural and social sciences. Within an academic field, scienti ...

s covering a broad range of Tasmanian natural history, as well as popular guides to Tasmanian birds and mammals. He has been recognised in the scientific names of several animals, including a parasitic

fly Flies are insects of the Order (biology), order Diptera, the name being derived from the Ancient Greek, Greek δι- ''di-'' "two", and πτερόν ''pteron'' "wing". Insects of this order use only a single pair of wings to fly, the hindwing ...

, a

bird louse A bird louse is any chewing louse (small, biting insects) of order Phthiraptera which parasitizes warm-blooded animals, especially birds. Bird lice may feed on feathers, skin, or blood. They have no wings, and their biting mouth parts distingui ...

, three

flea Flea, the common name for the order Siphonaptera, includes 2,500 species of small flightless insects that live as external parasites of mammals and birds. Fleas live by ingesting the blood of their hosts. Adult fleas grow to about long, a ...

s, a

mite Mites are small arachnids (eight-legged arthropods). Mites span two large orders of arachnids, the Acariformes and the Parasitiformes, which were historically grouped together in the subclass Acari, but genetic analysis does not show clear evid ...

, two fish, a

skink Skinks are lizards belonging to the family Scincidae, a family in the infraorder Scincomorpha. With more than 1,500 described species across 100 different taxonomic genera, the family Scincidae is one of the most diverse families of lizards. Ski ...

(''

Carinascincus greeni The alpine cool-skink (''Carinascincus greeni'') is a species of skink in the family Scincidae. It is endemic to Australia, found in Tasmania ) , nickname = , image_map = Tasmania in Austra ...

)'', Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). ''The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles''. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii + 296 pp. . (Green, p. 107). and a

subspecies In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...

of the Tasmanian

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

Scrubtit The scrubtit (''Acanthornis magna'') is a species of bird in the thornbill family Acanthizidae. It is endemic to Tasmania and King Island in Australia. Its natural habitat is the temperate rainforest, ''Nothofagus'' beech forest and eucalypt w ...

(''Acanthornis magnus greenianus'').

Honours

* 1987 – conferred

Doctor of Science Doctor of Science ( la, links=no, Scientiae Doctor), usually abbreviated Sc.D., D.Sc., S.D., or D.S., is an academic research degree awarded in a number of countries throughout the world. In some countries, "Doctor of Science" is the degree used f ...

''honoris causa'' by the

University of Tasmania The University of Tasmania (UTAS) is a public research university, primarily located in Tasmania, Australia. Founded in 1890, it is Australia's fourth oldest university. Christ College, one of the university's residential colleges, first pro ...

in recognition of a lifetime of achievement in zoology * 1990 – appointed Member of the

Order of Australia The Order of Australia is an honour that recognises Australian citizens and other persons for outstanding achievement and service. It was established on 14 February 1975 by Elizabeth II, Queen of Australia, on the advice of the Australian Gove ...

In recognition of service to conservation and the environment * 2005 – awarded W. Roy Wheeler Medallion by Bird Observation & Conservation Australia for excellence in field

ornithology Ornithology is a branch of zoology that concerns the "methodological study and consequent knowledge of birds with all that relates to them." Several aspects of ornithology differ from related disciplines, due partly to the high visibility and th ...

References

* People from Launceston, Tasmania 1925 births 2013 deaths Australian naturalists Australian nature writers Australian ornithologists Australian science writers Writers from Tasmania Australian curators Members of the Order of Australia {{Australia-ornithologist-stub