Early Days with the ESA

John Carnahan

Foundation Member ESA

Retired, ANU.

I am a foundation member of the Ecological Society of Australia, having been present at the inaugural meeting at CSIRO, Black Mountain, on 1 August 1960.  It was a jovial and enthusiastic gathering, as some of us had just dined well at the conference dinner of the Second Australian Weeds Conference.

In those days I was a Research Officer in the Ecology Section of the CSIRO Division of Plant Industry.  I was an active member of the Canberra Ecological Group, which took the initiative in establishing the ESA.  I was also a foundation member of the New Zealand Ecological Society, having taken part in their first meetings in Christchurch in May 1951 and in Wellington in May 1952.  I resigned from the NZES in 1989, but I have continued my membership of the ESA for 50 Years.

In August 1962 the ESA held a two-day meeting at the University of Sydney, in association with the Jubilee Congress of ANZAAS (Australian and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science).  This began with a symposium on 17 August on 'Variation and Adaptation of Species'.  This was followed on 18 August by the Second Annual General Meeting.  I was elected Secretary of the ESA at this meeting, with Professor Lindsay Pryor as President.  I had been asked to stand by Milton Moore, the retiring President, who had been largely responsible for starting the Society.

In January 1963 I moved across the road from CSIRO to take up an appointment as Senior Lecturer in Botany (Plant Ecology) at the Australian National University.  I shortly found myself heavily involved in the organisation for the next ANZAAS Congress, to be held in Canberra in January 1964.  As Secretary of the ESA, I was also involved in arranging the participation of the Society in the Congress.  Eventually we held joint meetings with Section D (Zoology) and Section M (Botany), and also an Ordinary General Meeting on 21 January.

I continued as Secretary, under the successive Presidencies of Lindsay Pryor, Francis Ratcliffe and Ray Perry, until the Fifth Annual General Meeting of 19 August 1965.  This AGM was again held in association with an ANZAAS Congress, this time in Hobart.  On this occasion, the ESA had arranged three symposia, on 'The Training of Ecologists', 'Ecological Research in Tasmania' and 'Sirex in Tasmania '.  For some of us, one happy memory from this Congress was of a reception, I think arranged by the foresters, at which the central attraction was a wooden keg of Cascade.

Relieved of Secretarial responsibilities, I was able to enjoy the Society's three-day symposium on 'Plant and Animal Sociality' at the University of New England in February 1966. This was really our first full Conference.  A highlight of this gathering was the participation of the redoubtable Dr W T (Bill) Williams, who was pioneering the use of CSIRO's newfangled electronic computer to classify plants and vegetation.  Later in Canberra, he featured me and my ecology students in the shooting for the CSIRO film, 'Classifying by Computer'.

The ESA again took part in the next ANZAAS Congress, at Melbourne in January 1967.  In particular, the Society presented a symposium on 'Ecology and Behaviour' within Section D (Zoology).  Bill Williams delivered the Presidential Address for Section M (Botany), entitled 'The Computer Botanist'.  This was made into a film of the same name, which incorporated 'Classifying by Computer'.  It was later shown on ABC TV, but I don't know what became of the film.

Later I served a further year as an Ordinary Member of an enlarged Council, being elected at the Seventh AGM of 23 August 1967.  By then, the Society's membership had risen to 244, from 125 in August 1961. These numbers appear small today, but they included many distinguished Australian ecologists.  From 1967 onwards, it was through these contacts that I was first led into, and then helped with, the vegetation mapping projects that were among my main activities for the rest of my professional life.

I have always enjoyed the challenge of pioneering situations, and I certainly enjoyed being involved in the pioneering days of the ESA.