Rolf Grantsau

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Rolf Karl-Heinz Grantsau mostly just Rolf Grantsau (born March 25, 1928 in Kiel ; † June 25, 2015 in São Paulo ) was a German biologist and especially ornithologist .

Live and act

In 1957, Grantsau married Ilse, ten years his junior, with whom he had the children Marion Grantsau-Engelbrecht and Ingo Grantsau.

Already in early youth, Grantsau was interested in nature and wild animals. After the end of the Second World War , he first worked at the zoological institute of the University of Kiel . There he learned the basics of taxidermy and scientific illustration. Although he also attended the zoological lectures, he was unable to obtain a scientific degree there due to the lack of a high school diploma. At the university he met Maria and Hans-Wilhelm Koepcke , who later invited him to Peru for bird studies. Because of his marriage, he initially discarded these plans and began working as a bird ringer at the Heligoland ornithological station a few years later . After two and a half years on Heligoland , he decided to realize his lifelong dream and study either birds of paradise or hummingbirds in their natural habitat . He learned ornithology under Erwin Stresemann and so he decided to follow his fellow student Helmut Sick and migrate to Brazil with his family.

When he arrived in São Paulo in 1962, he immediately began his taxonomic studies of the hummingbirds. But his interest in nature went far beyond birds. He also studied the collected mammals, reptiles, insects, orchids, carnivorous plants, lichens, etc. He worked privately for a German car factory and his research was limited to his leisure time. Nevertheless, he managed to explore many areas in Brazil. In the 1980s he made two trips to Antarctica and wrote an unpublished book on the fauna of the Antarctic that dealt with crustaceans, fish and birds. All of his discoveries were illustrated and classified by him. However, financial restrictions prevented the publication of the work. Other previously published works such as bats Brazil or poison dart frog of Brazil followed. In his final years he worked on books on moths and a new monograph on hummingbirds .

His four main published works include The Hummingbirds of Brazil from 1989, The Poisonous Snakes of Brazil from 1991, two volumes on birds that appeared under the name Guia Completo para Identificação das Aves do Brasil in 2010, and As Serpentes Peçonhentas do Brasil , an extension of his poisonous snake book, published in 2013. The first two books were published in both German and Portuguese.

His drawings have appeared in many journals and books by other researchers. Grantsau support many scientific institutes such as B. the Museu de Zoologia da Universidade de São Paulo and the Instituto Butantan and helped set up the Museu de História Natural Center in Bahia . He was also an honorary member of the Centro de Estudos Ornigológicos in São Paulo, as well as the Comitê Brasileiro de Registros Ornitológicos .

Grantsau was certainly an old-school naturalist who could do little with molecular genetic research . Nevertheless, his services as a classic naturalist for the nature of Brazil are undisputed.

Grantsau died of complications from a throat cancer .

First descriptions by Rolf Grantsau

Grantsau described some species or subspecies that were new to science. The species and subspecies include chronological and a .:

species

  • Kawall's Parrot ( Amazona kawalli Grantsau & Camargo , 1989)

Subspecies

Further subspecies were described by him, but these are mostly considered synonyms today.

Dedication names

The Brazilian entomologist Ubirajara Ribeiro Martins (1932-2015) dedicated a beetle species to him in 1967 by the name Gnomidolon grantsaui . In 2003 Fernando Rivadavia dedicated a carnivorous plant species to him under the name Drosera grantsaui . In 2007 Luiz Pedreira Gonzaga , Andre Moraes Pereira Carvalhaes and Dante Renato Corrêa Buzzetti named the Sincorá ant catcher Formicivora grantsaui in his honor .

Publications (selection)

  • Sôbre o gênero Augastes, com a descrição de uma subespécie nova (Aves, Trochilidae) . In: Papéis Avulsos de Zoologia, Museu de Zoologia da Universidade de São Paulo . tape 21 , no. 3 , 1967, p. 21-31 .
  • The rediscovery of the Brazilian hummingbirds Augastes scutatus and Augastes lumachellus . In: Journal of Ornithology . tape 109 , no. 4 , 1968, p. 434-437 , doi : 10.1007 / BF01671577 ( link.springer.com ).
  • Uma nova espécie de Phaethornis (Aves, Trochilidae) . In: Papéis Avulsos de Zoologia, Museu de Zoologia da Universidade de São Paulo . tape 22 , no. 7 , 1969, p. 57-59 .
  • Uma nova especie de Threnetes (Aves, Trochilidae) . In: Papéis Avulsos de Zoologia, Museu de Zoologia da Universidade de São Paulo . tape 22 , no. 23 , 1969, p. 245-247 .
  • The hummingbirds of Brazil . Expressão e Cultura, Rio de Janeiro 1988, ISBN 978-85-208-0101-7 .
  • Os Beija Flores do Brasil . Expressão e Cultura, Rio de Janeiro 1988, ISBN 85-208-0100-5 .
  • As cobras venenosas do Brasil . Bandeirante, São Bernardo do Campo 1991, ISBN 85-7219-003-1 .
  • The poisonous snakes of Brazil . Bandeirante, São Bernardo do Campo 1991, ISBN 978-85-7219-005-3 .
  • with Hélio Ferraz de Almeida Camargo: Nova especie de Amazona (Aves, Psittacidae) . In: Revista Brasileira de Biologia . tape 49 , no. 4 , 1989, pp. 1017-1020 .
  • Uma nova espécie de Caprimulgus longirostris (Aves, Caprimulgidae) . In: Atualidades Ornitológicas . No. 145 , 2008, p. 4–5 ([www.ao.com.br/download/ao145_4.pdf ao.com.br] [PDF; 130 kB ]).
  • with Haroldo Palo Jr .: Guia Completo para Identificação das Aves do Brasil (Aves Não Passeriformes) . tape 1 . Vento Verde, São Carlos, São Paulo 2010, ISBN 978-85-64060-00-5 .
  • with Haroldo Palo Jr .: Guia Completo para Identificação das Aves do Brasil (Aves Passeriformes) . tape 2 . Vento Verde, São Carlos, São Paulo 2010, ISBN 978-85-64060-00-5 .
  • with Haroldo Palo Jr .: As Serpentes Peçonhentas do Brasil . Vento Verde, São Carlos, São Paulo 2013, ISBN 978-85-64060-02-9 .

literature

  • Pedro Cerqueira Lima: Necrológio Rolf Karl Heinz Granstau (1928-2015) . In: Atualidades Ornitológicas . No. 185 , 2015, p. 40 ( ao.com.br [PDF; 289 kB ]).
  • Pedro Cerqueira Lima, Vitor de Queiroz Piacentini: Obituary: Rolf Karl Heinz Grantsau (1928-2015) . In: Revista Brasileira de Ornitologia . tape 23 , no. 2 , 2015, p. 87–89 ( museu-goeldi.br [PDF; 907 kB ]).
  • Luiz Pedreira Gonzaga, Andre Moraes Pereira Carvalhaes, Dante Renato Corrêa Buzzetti: A new species of Formicivora respond from the Chapada Diamantina, eastern Brazil (Aves: Passeriformes: Thamnophilidae) . In: Zootaxa . No. 1473 , 2007, p. 25–44 ( planetofbirds.com [PDF; 5.8 MB ]).
  • Ubirajara Ribeiro Martins: Monografia da Tribo Ibidionini (Coleóptera, Cerambycinae) . In: Arquivos de zoologia do estado de São Paulo . tape 16 , no. 1 , 1967, p. 1–320 ( revistas.usp.br [PDF; 6.2 MB ]).
  • Fernando Rivadavia: Four New Species of Sundews, Drosera (Droseraceae), from Brazil . In: Carnivorous Plant Newsletter . tape 32 , no. 3 , 2003, p. 79-92 ( carnivorousplants.org ).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Pedro Cerqueira Lima u. a., p. 87.
  2. ↑ a b c Pedro Cerqueira Lima u. a., p. 88.
  3. ↑ Rick Simpson at Wader Quest
  4. ↑ Ubirajara Ribeiro Martins, p. 235.
  5. ↑ Fernando Rivadavia, p. 84.
  6. ↑ Luiz Pedreira Gonzaga et al. a., p. 41.

Remarks

  1. ↑ The ten year difference emerges from Ornitólogo alemão vira praça no ABC .
personal data
SURNAME Grantsau, Rolf
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Grantsau, Rolf Karl-Heinz (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German ornithologist
DATE OF BIRTH March 25, 1928
PLACE OF BIRTH Kiel
DATE OF DEATH June 25, 2015
Place of death São Paulo