Reginald William Sims

Reginald William Sims ( April 14, 1926 - 2012 ) was a British zoologist . After an initial interest in ornithology , he devoted himself to annelids (Annelida) from 1960 .

Life

Sims served in the Royal Navy during World War II and continued that service for several years after the war ended until he left the armed forces to study biology in Wales . In 1952 he got a job as a research assistant at the bird department of the Natural History Museum and in 1955 he became chief curator. In 1956 he accompanied Edward H. Bill Banks on a six-month expedition into the jungles of northern Borneo , during which 700 bird hides were collected. In 1954 he described the subspecies Turnix maculosus giluwensis of the spotted turkey , in 1957 the subspecies Malacocincla abbotti altera of the red-tailed mouse thrush and in 1958 the subspecies Butorides striata didii of the mangrove heron .

In 1960 Sims became head of the Annelida department in the Natural History Museum, the world's largest museum collection for annelids, where he devoted himself to the little bristles (oligochaeta). He had helpers all over the world, including in the Solomon Islands , Malta , Bolivia , West Africa and Anatolia , who collected annelids for him and sent them to London. He also corresponded with international colleagues.

The collection saw its biggest increase when Edward Glynn Easton joined the Sims team. In 1978 alone, 2,863 samples with little bristles were sent to the museum. In 1972 Sims and Easton published the article A numerical revision of the earthworm genus Pheretima auct. (Megascolecidae: Oligochaeta) with the recognition of new genera and an appendix on the earthworms collected by the Royal Society North Borneo Expedition , which is part of the standard literature on the earthworm genus Pheretima . In this publication, Sims and Easton presented the annelid species Ephemitra , Metaphire (as nomen novum ) and Pithemera . In 1978 Sims published the book Key Works to the Fauna and Flora of the British Isles and North-western Europe . In 1985 he published the book Earthworms: Keys and Notes for the Identification and Study of the Species , a standard work on the Annelworm fauna of Great Britain, which appeared in a revised edition in 1999. In 1986 he retired.

In 1985 Sims founded the International Earthworm Society (since 2009 Earthworm Society of Britain ) and organized the first conferences in Grange-over-Sands . He was also a member of the British Society of Soil Science , the Freshwater Biological Association and the Board of the Systematics Association .

literature

• Who's who of British Scientists (biographical entry on page 741), Ohio University Press, 1969
• Emma Sherlock, Louise Berridge: In Memoriam Reginald William Sims Opuscula Zoologica Budapest, 2012, 43 (1), pp. 101-105

Web links

• Profile at the Natural History Museum