Lowery, Bede Barlow (1924-1996)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
Bede B. Lowery was a Jesuit priest who was a keen amateur ant collector. After completing schooling at St Ignatius in Lane Cove, New South Wales he went into the priesthood. Following his ordination Lowery worked for 22 years teaching at several Jesuit colleges. He then undertook 18 years of parish duties across Australia including Murwillumbah (NSW), St George and Giru (Queensland), Clare (South Australia) and Canberra. He moved to Tasmania in about 1989. Lowery collaborated with Bob Taylor of Australian National Insect Collection from 1956 for over 40 years, and they worked together on a monograph of the ants of Tasmania.

Reverend Bede Lowery worked for the Roman Catholic Church in many parts of Australia. He worked at Latrobe and Devonport for several years up to his death in 1996 at age 72. Bob Taylor, a retired CSIRO entomologist, described Bede's work in the Australian National Insect Collection newsletter (ANIC News 7:4-6, October 1995, and 11:12, October 1997). Bede greatly extended the checklist of Tasmanian ants during his residence in the State. He deposited three synoptic collections of ants in Tasmania, one each in the State Museums (QVMAG and TMAG) and one at Forestry Tasmania. During August, the authors visited Craig Reid at QVMAG to get our heads around the Tasmanian Myrmicinae.

ANT TAXONOMY
While Reverend Bede Lowery published only a handful of papers, by far his most significant contributions, second to none, were in collecting and field work. He possessed an unparalleled knowledge of Australian ants based on years of field collecting. At one stage he commented that it was the job of "professional" entomologists to publish papers while as an "amateur" he was free to focus on field work. And he excelled at field work. The bulk of his material is located at the.

PUBLICATIONS

 * Lowery, B. B. 1967. A new ant of the dacetine genus Orectognathus (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). J. Aust. Entomol. Soc. 6: 137-140.
 * Taylor, R. W.; Lowery, B. B. 1972. The New Guinean species of the ant genus Orectognathus Fr. Smith (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). J. Aust. Entomol. Soc. 11: 306-310.

REFERENCE

 * Bashford, R. Tasmanian Naturalist 120: 45-47.
 * Taylor, B. 1995. Australian National Insect Collection news 7: 4-6, portrait.