Alfred Seitz (biologist, 1905)

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Alfred Seitz (born February 21, 1905 in Gernsheim , Grand Duchy of Hesse , † August 2, 1982 in Nuremberg ) was an Austrian ethologist and ornithologist . From 1950 to 1970 he was director of the Nuremberg zoo .

Life

Alfred Seitz grew up in Vienna , where his father was the director of a large borax factory. On the premises of this factory there was a pond with a small stock of reeds in which the bumblebee was breeding. Since he had trained as a photographer after graduating from high school (1924) and was interested in the photographic documentation of bird behavior at an early age , he managed to get the bumblebee used to his presence so that he could observe their brood care at close range. Konrad Lorenz , who met Seitz in the late 1920s, wrote in a tribute to Alfred Seitz's 60th birthday:

“Like all other herons , the little bittern hatches from the first egg, so that, given the high number of clutching this bird, the oldest young is often a week older than the youngest. In the case of gray , blue and purple herons , a much smaller age difference is sufficient to deprive the youngest bird in a brood of almost all chances of survival, since the parents are best able to feed the most effectively begging young. Young bumblebees, on the other hand, are almost exactly the same size when they fly out, despite their high number. Seitz solved the riddle: with beautiful picture documents he showed how the feeding old people keep the heavily begging big boys waiting and pass them selectively to feed the smallest, even when they are sleeping and have to be shaken up first. "

In addition to a commercial activity in the 1920s and studying biology in the 1930s, Seitz supported Konrad Lorenz's ethological studies, among other things as a volunteer cameraman. Even after the turn of the millennium, one of these early behavioral film documents, the ethology of the greylag goose from 1937, is still available online for teaching purposes via the Technical Information Library. In 1939, Seitz completed his studies in Konrad Lorenz's group with a doctoral thesis on the pairing of cichlids , the findings of which were also included in two specialist articles that belong to "the classic work of ethology". After completing his doctorate, Seitz became a curator at the Landesmuseum Burgenland in Eisenstadt that same year . In 1940 but was for military service in the German army convened he held until 1945 in Königsberg ableistete - as a research assistant by Konrad Lorenz, the professor of comparative in the same year psychology at the Department of Psychology, Faculty of Arts, University of Konigsberg had been appointed .

After a brief captivity in Novosibirsk , Seitz went to Frankfurt am Main in 1946 and assisted Bernhard Grzimek in the reconstruction of the Frankfurt Zoo . In 1950 he was appointed director of the Nuremberg zoo, an office that he held until 1970. During his term of office, among other things, the reconstruction of the monkey house and the lion, flamingo and kangaroo enclosures, the hippopotamus house, the seal enclosure, as well as the establishment of the Association of Zoo Friends Nuremberg . As early as 1959 the animal population had again reached the "pre-war level", and in 1964 the population was supplemented by this species thanks to the construction of a new giraffe house. In addition to and thanks to his full-time work in the zoo, Seitz also spent years researching the relationships between dogs (Canidae), which include foxes , various species known as “ jackals ”, coyotes and wolves .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Konrad Lorenz : Alfred Seitz 60 years. In: Zeitschrift für Tierpsychologie . Volume 22, No. 5, 1965, pp. 600-602, full text
  2. ↑ Konrad Lorenz: Ethology of the Greylag Goose , doi: 10.3203 / IWF / C-560
  3. ↑ Alfred Seitz: The pair formation in some cichlids. I. Pair formation in Astatotilapia strigigena pepper. In: Zeitschrift für Tierpsychologie. Volume 4, No. 1, 1940, pp. 40–84, doi: 10.1111 / j.1439-0310.1940.tb00617.x
    Alfred Seitz: The pairing of some cichlids. II. Pairing in Hemichromis bimaeulatus Gill. In: Zeitschrift für Tierpsychologie. Volume 5, No. 1, 1942, pp. 74-101, doi: 10.1111 / j.1439-0310.1942.tb00648.x
  4. ↑ Nuremberg Zoo : The landscape zoo at Schmausenbuck and its directors. On: tiergarten.nuernberg.de , 2014, p. 43
  5. ↑ 100 years of the Nuremberg Zoo. On: tiergarten.nuernberg.de , 2012, p. 42 (PDF)
personal data
SURNAME Seitz, Alfred
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian ethologist and zoo director
DATE OF BIRTH February 21, 1905
PLACE OF BIRTH Gernsheim
DATE OF DEATH 2nd August 1982
Place of death Nuremberg