Goodier, Rawdon

Note that the image shows James Phipps (left) and Rawdon Goodier (right) at Domboshawa in 1961.

Born 31 Jan 1931, Upminster, Essex, England. Husband of J.H. Goodier.

1953

University College, London, graduating B.Sc. in zoology and botany. His studies included a course in plant ecology, under Professor W H Pearsall, and stimulated his interest in this subject.

1955-61

was employed as an entomologist in the Department of Tsetse & Trypanosomiasis Control and Reclamation, in the Federal Government Ministry of Agriculture. During his service with this Department he was stationed at four localities within the tsetse belts in Rhodesia:

• Jan to Sept 1956 at Kariba
• Oct 1956 to May 1957 in the Sabi Valley
• May 1957 to Sept 1958 near Karoi in the Urungwe District
• Jul to Dec 1959, again in the Urungwe District
• Dec 1959 to July 1961 at Chipinda Pools on the Lundi River.

1958 (Sept) to 1959 (Jul)

attended a course at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

1961 (Jul)

returned to the UK, and joined the Nature Conservancy as Regional Officer for North Wales in Jan 1962.

Entomologist and ecologist

• He carried out vegetation mapping of the tsetse fly habitat in the Chirundu area, from aerial photographs. He began to collect plants of the areas he was mapping in order to identify and define the plant communities. After this he continued to collect plants in the different parts of the country in which he worked.
• R.J. Phelps, in the Tsetse Research Branch, was also stationed at Kariba at that time.
• His plant collection notebooks, and that of his wife J.H. Goodier, were deposited in the RBG Edinburgh library. His African Journals and other material are in the manuscript collections of the National Library of Scotland (Accession No. 12397).

Chimanimani Mts

• His first visits to the Chimanimani Mts were made in March and July 1956, as a member of the Mountain Club of Rhodesia. During these he became greatly interested in the botany and ecology of these mountains, and arranged a botanical excursion to the Chimanimanis with J.B. Phipps, a botanist and friend, whom he had met at SRGH in connection with the identification of his tsetse work plant collections. Their first trip to the Chimanimani Mts was made in Jan/Feb 1957, and for the next three years they spent almost all their leave working together in the mountains.
• The Goodier & Phipps Chimanimani collections were given a separate enumeration from those made by each collector individually.

Selected publications

These include papers relating to tsetse control and papers on African Horse flies (Tabanidae), as well as:

• Goodier, R. & J.B. Phipps. A revised checklist of the vascular plants of the Chimanimani Mts. Kirkia 1: 44-67 (1961). (includes a contour map).
• Goodier, R. & J.B. Phipps. A vegetation map of the Chimanimani National Park. Kirkia 3: 2-7 (1962). (includes a geological map).
• Phipps, J.B. & R. Goodier. A Preliminary account of the plant ecology of the Chimanimani Mountains. J.Ecol. 50: 291-319 (1962).