{{Short description|Australian horticulturist and lichenologist}} {{Use dmy dates|date=July 2025}} {{Use Australian English|date=July 2025}}
'''Douglas "Doug" Verdon''' (13 February 1920 – 31 July 2000) was a British‑born Australian horticulturist and lichenologist whose work expanded knowledge of the genus ''Leptogium'' and other Australasian lichens. Best known for his long association with the Australian National Botanic Gardens and his post‑retirement research at the Australian National University, he published new species, co‑described a new genus, and mentored many colleagues in cryptogamic botany. Several lichen taxa have been named in his honour.
==Biography==
Verdon was born in Wallasey, near Liverpool, and spent most of his childhood in the National Children's Home on the Isle of Man, leaving at fourteen to labour during the Great Depression before a brief period living rough in London.<ref name="www.canbr.gov.au"/> He enlisted in the Royal Air Force as a fitter and served for eleven years, seeing wartime duty in the Middle East, North, East and South Africa, and Italy, where an exchange of deliberately inaccurate fire with a German Heinkel left neither side harmed.<ref name="Elix 2001"/> After the war he married Eileen, and a short experiment with farming in Shropshire preceded the family's migration to Australia in 1958.<ref name="Elix 2001"/> Initially employed in a Pialligo market garden, he joined the Government Nursery at Yarralumla in 1962, studied horticulture at Canberra Institute of Technology, and soon moved into the new Horticultural Research Unit.<ref name="www.canbr.gov.au"/>
In 1968 Verdon transferred to the herbarium of the Canberra Botanic Gardens (later the Australian National Botanic Gardens), where he identified thousands of specimens from major Western Australian expeditions and developed a flair for taxonomic work.<ref name="www.canbr.gov.au"/> His horticultural achievements included producing "Doug's Hybrid" or "Canberry Coronet", a showy waratah derived from ''Telopea speciosissima'' × ''T. mongaensis''.<ref name="Elix 2001"/> By the mid‑1970s lichens had become his principal interest, and he spent the last part of his paid career focusing on their taxonomy, retiring from the Gardens in 1985.<ref name="www.canbr.gov.au"/> He then accepted a position in the department of chemistry at the Australian National University, collaborating with professor Jack Elix from 1986 until 1998 and working actively until the age of seventy‑eight.<ref name="Elix 2001"/>
Verdon's research centred on the complex Australasian members of the genus ''Leptogium'', leading to the description of several new species in 1990 and the preparation of the genus treatment for the 1992 ''Flora of Australia'' lichen volume.<ref name="Elix 2001"/> With Elix he also erected the new genus ''Myelorrhiza'' in the Cladoniaceae and described additional species in ''Physma'' and ''Solenopsora'' with Gerhard Rambold.<ref name="Elix 2001"/> His lichen collections, gathered widely across eastern Australia, are housed in the Australian National Herbarium and continue to underpin current studies.<ref name="Lepp 2011"/> Even after retirement he travelled to European institutions in Berlin, Paris, London, Copenhagen and Uppsala to examine historical lichen material, further refining Australian taxonomy.<ref name="www.canbr.gov.au"/>
==Legacy and impact==
Colleagues remembered Verdon for his dry humour, generosity, and willingness to assist with everything from Latin translations to microscopic investigations of obscure ascal structures.<ref name="Elix 2001"/> His approachable manner and strong sense of fairness won him respect within the botanical community and beyond, leading one outback acquaintance to call him "a real wacker", high praise for an immigrant from the Isle of Man.<ref name="Elix 2001"/> Verdon's publications, herbarium specimens and mentorship laid a foundation for subsequent Australian lichenology, influencing researchers such as Simone Louwhoff and Jen Johnston who continued work on groups he helped define.<ref name="Lepp 2011"/> Survived by his wife Eileen, a daughter and a son, he left a lasting imprint on both horticulture and cryptogamic botany in Australia.<ref name="www.canbr.gov.au"/>
Several lichen taxa have been named in honour of Verdon: ''Cratiria verdonii'' {{au|Elix (2014)}},<ref name="Elix 2014"/> ''Heterodermia verdonii'' {{au|Elix (2011)}},<ref name="Elix 2011"/> ''Lecanora pseudogangaleoides'' subsp. ''verdonii'' {{au|Lumbsch (1995)}},<ref name="Lumbsch 1995"/> ''Pertusaria verdonii'' {{au|A.W.Archer (1992)}},<ref name="Elix 1992"/> ''Physcia verdonii'' {{au|Elix (2011)}},<ref name="Elix 2011b"/> and ''Xanthoparmelia verdonii'' {{au|Elix & J.Johnst. (1986)}}.<ref name="Elix et al. 1986"/>
{{botanist|Verdon}}
==References== {{Reflist|colwidth=30em||refs=
<ref name="Elix et al. 1986">{{cite journal |last1=Elix |first1=J.A. |last2=Johnston |first2=J. |last3=Armstrong |first3=P.M. |year=1986 |title=A revision of the lichen genus ''Xanthoparmelia'' in Australasia |journal=Bulletin of the British Museum of Natural History |volume=15 |pages=163–362 [346]}}</ref>
<ref name="Elix 1992">{{cite journal |last1=Elix |first1=J.A. |last2=Streimann |first2=H. |last3=Archer |first3=A.W. |year=1992 |title=The lichens of Norfolk Island 2: The genera ''Cladonia'', ''Pertusaria'', ''Pseudocyphellaria'' and ''Ramalina'' |journal=Proceedings of the Linnean Society of New South Wales |volume=113 |pages=57–76 |url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/34942503#page/69/mode/1up}}</ref>
<ref name="Elix 2001">{{cite journal |last=Elix |first=Jack |year=2001 |title=Obituary-Vale Doug Verdon, 1920–2000 |journal=Australasian Lichenology |volume=48 |page=4 |url=https://www.anbg.gov.au/abrs/lichenlist/AL_48.pdf}}</ref>
<ref name="Elix 2011">{{cite journal |last=Elix |first=J. |year=2011 |title=Three new species of ''Heterodermia'' (Physciaceae, Ascomycota) from Australia |journal=Australasian Lichenology |volume=68 |pages=16–21 |url=https://www.anbg.gov.au/abrs/lichenlist/AL_68.pdf}}</ref>
<ref name="Elix 2011b">{{cite journal |last=Elix |first=John A. |year=2011 |title=New species of ''Physcia'' (Physciaceae, lichenized Ascomycota) from Australasia |journal=Australasian Lichenology |volume=68 |pages=28–39 |url=https://www.anbg.gov.au/abrs/lichenlist/AL_68.pdf}}</ref>
<ref name="Elix 2014">{{cite journal |last=Elix |first=J.A. |year=2014 |title=New species and new records of the lichen genus ''Cratiria'' (Physciaceae, Ascomycota) in Australia |journal=Telopea |volume=16 |pages=141–148 |doi=10.7751/telopea20147894 |bibcode=2014Telop..16..141E |doi-access=free}}</ref>
<ref name="Lepp 2011">{{cite web |last=Lepp |first=Heino |title=History. After the first century |publisher=Australian National Botanic Gardens |date=4 April 2011 |url=https://www.canbr.gov.au/lichen/history-3.html |access-date=30 July 2025}}</ref>
<ref name="Lumbsch 1995">{{cite journal |last=Lumbsch |first=H.T. |year=1995 |title=A new species in the ''Lecanora subfusca'' group containing usnic acid in addition to atranorin |journal=The Lichenologist |volume=27 |issue=3 |pages=161–167 |doi=10.1016/S0024-2829(95)80015-8 |bibcode=1995ThLic..27Q.161L }}</ref>
<ref name="www.canbr.gov.au">{{cite web |title=Biographical notes. Verdon, Doug (1920 - 2000) |publisher=Australian National Botanic Gardens |date=9 April 2015 |url=https://www.canbr.gov.au/biography/verdon-doug.html |access-date=30 July 2025}}</ref>
}} {{Authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Verdon, Douglas}}
Category:1920 births Category:2000 deaths Category:20th-century Australian scientists Category:Australian horticulturists Category:Australian lichenologists Category:Australian taxonomists Category:People from Wallasey