J. Denis Summers-Smith | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1920-10-25)25 October 1920 Glasgow, Scotland |
| Died | 5 May 2020(2020-05-05) (aged 99)[1][2] |
| Nationality | Scottish |
| Known for | Research onsparrows, books ontribology |
| Awards | Tribology Silver Medal (1975) Stamford Raffles Award |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Ornithology Tribology |
| Institutions | Imperial Chemical Industries |
James Denis Summers-Smith (25 October 1920 – 5 May 2020) was a Scottish ornithologist and mechanical engineer, a specialist both insparrows and in industrialtribology.
Summers-Smith was raised in Glasgow, where he was born in 1920.[3] He spent childhood holidays inCounty Donegal, in northwestern Ireland, where one of his uncles, a country parson and a naturalist, taught him about birds. For nearly six years ofWorld War II, Summers-Smith was an intelligence officer in theBritish Army.[4] He received his commission in 1940,[5] and reached the rank ofcaptain. He served with the 9th Battalion,The Cameronians, stationed on the east coast of England. During that time he had little time for birdwatching, except when surveying "such likely spots for invasion" as coastal marshes inSuffolk.[4] Summers-Smith was among the second wave of troops involved in theD-Day landings of 6 June 1944. He was badly wounded in a later action in Normandy, as a result of which he spent 18 months in hospital.
After the war, Summers-Smith was employed as a mechanical engineer byImperial Chemical Industries.[3][6] He obtained several degrees in engineering around this time, and a PhD in physics in 1953.[7] In 1975, Summers-Smith received one of the three annual Tribology Silver Medals given by theInstitution of Mechanical Engineers.[7] His job as an engineer allowed him to travel widely, and he used trips abroad as opportunities to study sparrows.[4]
Summers-Smith began his study of thehouse sparrow in 1947. He decided to make a serious study of a particular bird species, and chose the house sparrow because of the difficulty of travel at the time, underpost-war rationing.[4] Summers-Smith has studied the house sparrow inHighclere, Hampshire; inHartburn, County Durham; and latterly atGuisborough in North Yorkshire, where he settled in 1961.[4] During these studies, he was questioned by a policeman on the street twice for looking around yards with binoculars at early hours. Summers-Smith was a founding member of his local bird club (TheTeesmouth Bird Club) in 1960, and he wrote the instructions for theBritish Trust for Ornithology's first Common Bird Census in 1962.[6] His study of the house sparrow resulted not only in a number of papers in respected journals, but also in his 1963 monographThe House Sparrow, published as part of theNew Naturalist Monographs series.[8][9][10] AfterThe House Sparrow was published, Summers-Smith began studying the house sparrow's relatives in thegenusPasser.[11] Over the course of these studies, he visited dozens of countries, and made observations on all thePasser species (recognised in his classification) except theSocotra sparrow.[6][12] This research into the sparrows as a whole resulted in a monograph on the genusPasser, published in 1988 asThe Sparrows, and one on theEurasian tree sparrow, the 1995The Tree Sparrow, both of which were illustrated byRobert Gillmor. He also wroteIn Search of Sparrows, an account of his worldwide travels researching sparrows.[11] In 1992, Summers-Smith received theZoological Society of London'sStamford Raffles Award, for his "world-renowned work on sparrows".[13]
InThe House Sparrow, Summers-Smith predicted that the house sparrow would have "a bright future", but instead it went into a severe decline in many parts of the world, beginning in the 1970s.[14] Summers-Smith studied this decline extensively, but he called it "one of the most remarkable wildlife mysteries of the last fifty years". WhenThe Independent offered a £5,000 prize for an explanation of the decline of the house sparrow in 2000, Summers-Smith acted as a referee.[15] In 2008, the prize was almost awarded to Dr. Kate Vincent ofDe Montfort University and several colleagues, who attributed the decline of the house sparrow to falling insect numbers.[16][17]
In 2009, Summers-Smith was the author of the section of theHandbook of the Birds of the World on the familyPasseridae.[18]
