Rosemary Lowe‐McConnell 1921–2014 (Freshwater Biological Association and British Museum of Natural History)

Ro at Jinja in Uganda c. 1949–52, and signing her books at the Linnean Society of London in 2006. Dr Rosemary Lowe-McConnell, or ‘Ro’ to her many friends and colleagues, died peacefully on 22 December 2014 in St Rita's Care Home, Ditchling, East Sussex, U.K. She was a distinguished fish and fisheries biologist who first worked for the U.K.'s Freshwater Biological Association (FBA) and later became a Scientific Research Associate of the British Museum of Natural History (BMNH; the Natural History Museum, London). She revolutionized global studies on freshwater ecosystems and fisheries production and worked to feed the world with farmed ‘aquatic chicken’ (Tilapia fishes). Revolutionary social, cultural, political, economic and scientific change characterized the ‘roaring twenties’ or ‘jazz age’ into which Ro was born. Following World War I, there was a major social upheaval everywhere and the success of Bolshevism in Russia saw communist parties established around the globe. Home Rule for southern Ireland took effect and the remaining U.K. saw a collapse of traditional industries such as coalmining and shipbuilding. Ro's birthplace, the industrial port of Liverpool, became a particular ‘hotspot’ for unemployment which rose nationally to two million. By 1926 (when Ro was 5 years old), 160 million working days were lost to strikes (Grant, 2011). Concerns over mass immigration from impoverished eastern and southern Europe were vociferously expressed, which fact has contemporary echoes! Protests over women's suffrage also escalated but by 1928 full voting rights were achieved. Renewed industrialization saw resurgence in the economy and a proliferation of domestic electricity, automobiles, passenger airlines, airmail, plastics, telephones, radios, television and motion pictures. Science in this progressive, breathtaking new age demonstrated that the universe extends far beyond our own galaxy, antibiotics were discovered and biological theories developed on the origins of life and on genomic inheritance (Winston, 2013). Applied biology came to the fore as a social and economic tool for increased productivity in medicine, agriculture and fisheries. There followed unprecedented, albeit still severely limited, educational, scientific and career opportunities for women entering these fields. Interestingly, the social respectability of fishes as objects of ‘appropriate’ study by females was already firmly established by the ‘aquarium craze’ of Victorian and Edwardian eras (Reid & Moore, 2014). A promising pupil, Rosemary Lowe became a boarder in Howell's Independent School, Denbigh, north Wales (1935–1939). Exclusively for girls and with all-female teachers, this private establishment boasted 120 rural acres, set in the Vale of Clywd. A rich photographic and cinematographic archive of pupil activities in the 1930s is held in the National Library of Wales. Ro certainly flourished academically and also enjoyed the excellent sporting facilities including a swimming pool. At the outbreak of World War II she registered for a BSc degree in zoology in the University of Liverpool, remarkably enduring the ‘Blitz’. This was a ferocious and sustained bombing campaign from 1940, with about 4000 local casualties. In 1942, she attended an Easter class in quantitative freshwater biology run by the FBA (established in 1929 and still in its infancy) in the Lake District. There she met fellow student David Le Cren (1922–2011) who eventually rose to become Director of the FBA and President of the Fisheries Society of the British Isles (FSBI). Ro and David became life-long friends and close scientific collaborators (Le Cren & Lowe-McConnell, 1980; Lowe-McConnell, 2011). She graduated in 1943 and, with David, was immediately offered a salary of £212 a year…. to return to the FBA to assist in wartime projects to augment much-needed food from Britain's freshwaters. Lake Windermere perch Perca fluviatilis proved to be one productive source of nutrition, with some 90 t per year harvested during the war. Ro successfully experimented on eel Anguilla anguilla fisheries with collaborator and close friend Peggy Varley (neé Margaret Brown, 1918–2009) (Lowe, 1952a, b; Varley et al., 2002). Athletic and adventurous, Ro went on the first of many expeditions to the colonies, and was travelling in Africa in August 1945 when atomic bombs devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so bringing World War II to an end. Following in the wake of life-long friend and scientific mentor Edgar Barton Worthington (1905–2001), she surveyed Lake Malawi (then Nyasa) fisheries for the government and dived with early aqualung gear. There followed periods in the Okavango Swamps, Botswana (then Bechuanaland) and Uganda, in the Jinja research laboratory established for the Great Lakes by the East African Fisheries Research Organization. Ro vigorously pursued studies on African perch-like tilapiine cichlids, spotting their great potential in fish farming and successfully promoting their use as a protein source in developing countries worldwide (Lowe, 1952a, b). Recognizing her outstanding research, Ro was awarded MSc and DSc degrees from Liverpool (1946 and 1955). She met geologist Richard McConnell while in the Colonial Research Service but, on their marriage in 1953, was forced to resign under rigid career rules which marginalized women. This was not the first or last time she experienced irrational and unfair discrimination. The couple travelled to British Guiana (now Guyana, South America) where Ro continued her adventures looking at seasonal cycles and productivity in both freshwater and marine ecosystems (Lowe-McConnell, 2000). By 1962, she was an Associate of the BMNH working alongside distinguished ichthyological friends and colleagues Ethelwynn Trewavas (1900–1993) and Humphry Greenwood (1927–1995), both also African cichlid specialists. Ro's scientific interests, however, went far beyond museum-based systematic biology, evolution and zoogeography; her work also encompassed ecology, seasonal cycles, behaviour, reproduction, conservation, fisheries production and the positive and negative effects of fish introductions and dams on the environment (Lowe-McConnell, 1966, 2003). In 1961, the International Union of Biological Sciences planned a decade (1964–1974) for the International Biological Programme (IBP) focused on worldwide principles of biological production including in African fresh waters, with research centred on Lake George, Uganda. Ro, of course, became a leading light in the IBP under the direction of Edgar Barton Worthington and the profound global outputs of the team of 54 researchers are admirably summarized in The Functioning of Freshwater Ecosystems (Le Cren & Lowe-McConnell, 1980). She frequently returned to Liverpool to contribute to university meetings organized by Jack Jones for the burgeoning ‘school of applied fish biology’ (Talling, 2004). Out of these sprang two important scientific bodies: the FSBI (established in 1967, with its Journal of Fish Biology) and the Institute of Fisheries Management (established in 1969). With much further globe-trotting (including to Nigeria, Ghana, Brazil, Guyana and Panama), Ro, unique among her peers, now had the in-depth experience, scientific maturity and breadth of vision to forge general principles of tropical freshwater ecology, combining old and new world perspectives. Famously, she drove her publishers wild by submitting difficult-to-decipher hand-written manuscripts. Among many, now classic, later publications are: Fish Communities in Tropical Freshwaters (Lowe-McConnell, 1975), Ecology of Fishes in Tropical Waters (Lowe-McConnell, 1977), Ecological Studies in Tropical Fish Communities (Lowe-McConnell, 1987), Land of Waters: Explorations in the Natural History of Guyana (Lowe-McConnell, 2000) and her often humorous autobiography The Tilapia Trail: the Life Story of a Fish Biologist (Lowe-McConnell, 2006). Many of these publications were typed, collated, edited and illustrated by Gordon John Howes (1938–2013; Harrison et al., 2013) who also helped organize a voluminous private library for research continuing in ‘retirement’. Prestigious honours gained by Ro include Vice-Presidency of the Linnean Society of London (1976) and their Gold Medal (1997); Naumann-Thienemann Medal of the International Society of Limnology (1995) and Beverton Medal of the FSBI (2000). Two new species were named for her: a mayfly Afroptilum loweae and catfish Bathyclarias loweae. Michael Bruton (Bruton, 1994) provides (in a thematic volume of Environmental Biology of Fishes dedicated to Women in Ichthyology) an in-depth review of Ro's remarkable achievements, an extensive bibliography of publications and the transcript of a personal interview. There is an excellent wide-ranging obituary in Environmental Biology of Fishes (Stiassny & Kaufmann, 2015) which covers different aspects. Pat and Mary Morris (trustees of Ro's estate) organized a touching memorial event in the Linnean Society of London in July, 2015. Ichthyological discoveries in Africa since Ro's time were well covered by Julia Day and Katherine Brown. Another of Ro's many acolytes, Melanie Stiassny (Research Curator in Ichthyology, American Museum of Natural History) also made a fine contribution to the proceedings. Ro was predeceased by Richard (1986) and they had no children. Nonetheless, youngsters loved her great sense of fun, as experienced by my own son Alexander who, with shrieks of laughter, did ‘roly polies’ with Ro down the steep grassy banks in her garden! Her affable nature, ready humour, extraordinary kindness and support for friends, researchers and students are legendary. She certainly helped to launch my career in ichthyology, once personally rescuing a box of my preserved African fish specimens that had accidently been conveyed from the BMNH to a waste tip in the Thames estuary! She often hosted guests in her quirky ‘mathematical brick’ house in Streat, beautifully set in the rolling green downs of East Sussex. Ro certainly had an extraordinary ability to bring together biologists from different institutions and countries. I have spoken to many colleagues over the years that made their way to Sussex to enjoy Ro's updates, welcome her advice, benefit from time in the home library and leave with a ‘to-do’ list of contacts and references. Indeed, she became a hub for the global community. By so generously sharing her knowledge, her connections and her home, Rosemary was critical in fostering and nurturing an international network in tropical fish and fisheries, one of the many substantial legacies she leaves behind. Shortly before she died, my wife Sally and I visited Ro in a retirement home in St George's Park, Ditchling, East Sussex. She was frail, incapacitated and bed-ridden owing to a fall, and ready to make a final move to a supervised residence under the kind ministrations of Pat and Mary Morris, Jennifer Greenwood (daughter of Humphry) and other close friends. Nonetheless Ro remained alert, lucid and in great spirits, chuckling as she waved a letter from a young, overseas zoology student pleading for Ro to act as her supervisor for a PhD in ichthyology! I am grateful to Lauren Chapman, McGill University, Canada and to my wife Sally Reid for helpful comments on the text and to Pat and Mary Morris for the photographs.

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