Ian Athol Edward Atkinson MSc (NZ) PhD (Hawaii) 1932–2019

Ian Atkinson was one of the most versatile ecologists ever to work on our shores, an original thinker and true allrounder whose broad scope covered plants, animals, and soils. A generalist of the old school rather than a narrowly focussed specialist, his career was notable for collaboration with experts in a variety of fields and for lasting contributions to vegetation mapping, soil mapping, volcanic succession, introduced rodent ecology, mammal-plant interactions, island ecology, and restoration ecology. A stalwart of the New Zealand Ecological Society, he held a number of offices, serving as Secretary 1960–1962, Vice-President 1965 and 1983–1985 and President 1985–1987, and he was also a longtime Councillor from 1962 till 1983. He was made a Life Member in 2001. Ian was born of English parents Leonard Gray Atkinson (1894–1965) and Winifred Atkinson née Goddard (1904–1994) in Hamilton on 6 October 1932. His father, an electrical draughtsman, had arrived here from London in 1924 to work for the Public Works Department, helping design Arapuni Power Station, the first in a long line of hydro-electric plants built by the government on the Waikato River. Leonard went Ian Atkinson on a family holiday on Big Island, Hawaii, 17 July 2007. (Photo: Cynthia Petersen).