Gerd Heinrich

Gerd Hermann Heinrich
Born (1896-11-07)November 7, 1896
Berlin, Germany
Died December 16, 1984(1984-12-16)
Farmington, Maine, United States
Fields Entomologist

Gerd Hermann Heinrich (born 7 November 1896, Berlin – died 16 December 1984, United States) was a German entomologist and ornithologist known for his studies of parasitic Hymenoptera of the Ichneumonidae family and for the description of several bird species in Celebes, Dutch East Indies.

Early life and education

Heinrich was born on 7 November 1896 in Berlin. He was the son of a physician, Hermann Heinrich. His mother, Margarethe von Tepper-Ferguson, was the heiress of a 1,344 ha farm at Borowke, between Poznan and Gdańsk, Poland. Heinrich grew up at Borowke which, prior to 1918, was in West Prussia. He was educated at home by a tutor until age eight and became fluent in Polish, German and Latin.[1] In 1914, Heinrich graduated primus omnium from the Askanische Gymnasium in Berlin. Heinrich planned a career in medicine, but his interest was in natural history, especially insects. He sought the advice of the curator of entomology at the Museum für Naturkunde and was guided towards study of parasitic wasps of the family Ichneumonidae, a large, diverse, and at that time, taxonomically poorly known group of insects.[1] Heinrich's education was interrupted by the onset of hostilities of World War I. He enlisted in the German army as a cavalryman fighting on the Eastern front and earned the Iron Cross he then transferred to the Luftwaffe and became a pilot. After the war, Heinrich returned to Borowke, married a local girl, Annaliese Machatchek and lived there with his family.[1]

Career

Europe

In 1927, Heinrich made an expedition to Mount Elbrus in Northern Persia. From 1930 to 1932, he visited the island of Sulawesi (Celebes) in Indonesia, including the Latimodjong mountains, Menkoka mountains, and Minahasa and the Molucca Islands including Halmahera and Batjan. From 1932 to 1937, Heinrich studied at the Humboldt University in Berlin and in 1932, he published a travelogue about Celebes. In 1934, Heinrich published his first major work, Die Ichneumoninae von Celebes (1934). In 1935, he made an expedition to the Balkan Mountains and the Rhodope Mountains in South-Eastern Europe. In 1938, he published the results of processing his collection of materials of the Ichneumoninae of Madagascar in Les Ichneumonides de Madagascar (1938).

In 1934, René Malaise, the Swedish entomologist, had organised a zoological expedition to the northeastern parts of Burma. The material he collected was sent to Heinrich for identification and classification. The abundance of bizarre, luxuriant, and unknown forms in this collection was so fascinating that Heinrich made his own expedition to the Chin Hills of Burma in 1937 and 1938.

World War II

In 1939, at the onset of hostilities in World War II, Heinrich's work was once again interrupted by war. Reluctantly, Heinrich enlisted in the German army, aware that for a Pole to not do so could be fatal.[1] In 1941, as the Russians pushed the Eastern front through Poland, Annaliese and the children fled westward. By the end of 1943, Heinrich did have a large monograph on oriental Ichneumoninae prepared for publication but as the front line approached, Heinrich soldered his monograph into a metal box, and secretly buried it in a dry place in the forest. He sent another copy to his friend, the physical chemist Max Vollmer.

From 1945 to 1951, when they emigrated to America, Henirich and his family lived in a small forester's hut in Hahnheide Forest.[1] Postwar Europe was a difficult place for academics. Heinrich contacted zoological organizations in every corner of Europe but not one of them had the funds for publication of his monograph. Heinrich did received the sponsorship of the ichneumonologist, Henry K. Townes, Jr. to emigrate.

America

In 1952 and 1953, Heinrich took part in a zoological expedition to Mexico. Between the years 1953 and 1963, he participated in expeditions to Africa, mainly to collect birds and mammals for Yale University, the University of Kansas, and the Field Museum of Natural History. During this time, he expanded his collection of ichneumon flies. Between 1953 and 1955, Heinrich participated in an expedition to Mount Moco and Mount Soke, Angola, West Africa. In 1957 and 1958 Heinrich returned to West Africa. From 1961 to 1963 he took part in an expedition to Tanganyika, Mount Meru, the Usambara mountains, the Uluguru mountains, the Livingston range and Mount Rungwe and the Ufipa Plateau in Tanzania and Rhodesia. In 1963, Heinrich visited South Africa.

Heinrich received partial support from the Canadian Department of Agriculture to complete the seven volume work Synopsis of Nearctic Ichneumoninae Stenopneusticae (1962).

In 1960, Heinrich realized that he would never return to access the Asian Ichneumoninae material he had hidden. He wrote to the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, describing the material's location and suggested using mine detectors to find the metal boxes containing the material. Polish scientists did just that, and, to everyone’s surprise, the insect specimens were preserved. The specimens were added to the collection of the Polish Academy of Sciences. The Academy invited Heinrich to work with the material at his discretion. Heinrich wrote on his memoir, "…this obstacle for the publication of the Oriental Monograph was, at last, eliminated".[2]

The materials collected in his African expeditions were published in Synopsis and Reclassification of the Ichneumoninae of Africa, south of the Sahara through a grant from the National Science Foundation, by Farmington College Press. In preparation for this monograph, Heinrich made a round trip through Europe. He visited all the major European museums to examine their African specimens. In Stockholm, he met the entomologists Erich Kjellander and René Malaise. The new version of Burmesische Ichneumoninae was published in seven parts in Entomologisk Tidskrift. A remaining four parts were subsequently published in the Annales Zoologici by the Polish Academy of Sciences from 1974 to 1980.

In 1977, Heinrich's last major monograph, Ichneumoninae of Florida and neighboring states (1977) was published. It contains descriptions of 50 genera and 135 species, 47 of which were new to science. His last article was published in 1980.

End of life and legacy

On December 16, 1984 Heinrich died aged 88.[3] He was survived by his wife, Hildegarde Bury Heinrich of Wilton; son, Bernd Heinrich of the University of Vermont; daughter, Marianne Gerda Sewall of Jefferson and four grandchildren.[4]

Many species of insects, especially Hymenoptera are named after Heinrich.[5] The Heinrichiellus hildegardae is named for Heinrich's wife, Hildegarde Maria.[6]

Contributions

During his career, Heinrich developed a standardized system of taxa description which facilitates taxa identification and comparative analysis. He is the author of 4 major publications on Ichneumonidae, 4 popular travelogues, 93 smaller but significant publications on Ichneumoninae, 3 publications on European mammals, 3 publications on the biology of the birds of Angola, and 2 publications on the systematics of the birds of Angola, coauthored with Sidney Dillon Ripley.[7][8] Heinrich described 1479 species and subspecies of Ichneumoninae from the Nearctic, Africa, Madagascar, Asia and the Palearctic.[9] Moreover, most of them were described based on his own collections. Therefore, the taxa described by him can be called “discovered” or “new to science”. Heinrich’s major publications are:

Heinrich also wrote travelogues about his expeditions to Celebes (1932), Burma (1940), and Persia (1933).

The Heinrich collections are curated in Warsaw (C. G. H. I), Poland (Instytut Zoologiczny, Polska Akademia Nauk), Munich (C. G. H. II), Germany (Zoologische Staatssammlung München),[9] the collection of H. Townes (Gensville, Florida) and partially (species from Madagascar and some others) in the Museum für Naturkunde, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.

Entomological publications

1920s

1930s

1940s

1950s

1960s

1970s

1980s

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Collar N. Gerd Heinrich Birding Asia 2009. Volume 11 pages 33 to 40. Accessed 11 October 2015.
  2. ↑ Gupta V. Contribution of G. Heinrich to the study of the subfamily Ichneumoninae (Hymenoptera: Ichneumonidae) together with a bibliography of his publications. Oriental insects 1989. Volume 23, pages 337 to 348.
  3. ↑ Heinrich B 2007 "The Snoring Bird: my family's journey through a century of biology
  4. ↑ The Lewiston Daily Sun 17 December 1984.
  5. ↑ Gerd Hermann Heinrich - Obituary. The Lewiston Daily Sun 18 December 1984.
  6. ↑ Tereshkin, 1996
  7. ↑ Weems H. Foreword. Arthropods of Florida and Neighboring Land Areas 1977. volum 9 pages 1 to 350.
  8. ↑ Weems H. and Howard W. In Memoriam: Gerd H. Heinrich. Florida Entomologist 1986. Volume 69(1) pages 182 to 281.
  9. 1 2 von Diller E. Chronik der Zoologischen Staatssammlung München. Spixiana 1992. Volume 17, pages 83 to 100.

Further reading

External links

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