Thomas Ford Chipp
Encyclopedia
Thomas Ford Chipp was a botanist who became Assistant Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, usually referred to as Kew Gardens, is 121 hectares of gardens and botanical glasshouses between Richmond and Kew in southwest London, England. "The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew" and the brand name "Kew" are also used as umbrella terms for the institution that runs...

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He played an important role in development of the study of ecology in the British Empire
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the...

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Early career

Chipp was born in 1886, son of a constable in Gloucester
Gloucester
Gloucester is a city, district and county town of Gloucestershire in the South West region of England. Gloucester lies close to the Welsh border, and on the River Severn, approximately north-east of Bristol, and south-southwest of Birmingham....

 who died when Thomas was five years old. Chipp was accepted by the Royal Masonic School
Royal Masonic School
The Royal Masonic School for Girls is an independent school in Rickmansworth, England with both day and boarding pupils. The school was instituted in 1788, with the aim of maintaining the daughters of indigent Freemasons, unable through death, illness, or incapacitation to support their families...

, and then became a student gardener at Kew. He was admitted to University College, London, earning a degree in botany in 1909. He then obtained a job as conservator of forests in the Gold Coast
Gold Coast (British colony)
The Gold Coast was a British colony on the Gulf of Guinea in west Africa that became the independent nation of Ghana in 1957.-Overview:The first Europeans to arrive at the coast were the Portuguese in 1471. They encountered a variety of African kingdoms, some of which controlled substantial...

 colony.
His reports from this period show enthusiasm for developing the colonial economy combined with interest in the local environment and people. Detailed reports on local estates covered topography, climate, ecology, commercial value and suggestions for improvements. The reports were written for the use of local landowners and were not published in scientific journals.

A highly organized man, with great attention to detail, Chipp made extensive use of forms and questionnaires to gather and collate information from many sources on subjects that ranged from tree growth rates to illegal woodcutting. He later applied this technique to his ecological research.
During World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

 (1914–1919) Chipp was an officer in the British Expeditionary Force in France, rising to the rank of major. After the war he returned to the Gold Coast and resumed his work on forest management. He published a dissertation on the ecology of the Gold Coast forests that gained him a doctoral degree from the University of London and was published as a book.

From Chipp's viewpoint, the natives were often an obstacle to efficient forest management. Describing the difficulty of establishing forest reserves in the Gold Coast, he said "every attempt to organise forestry on the same lines as obtain in other
parts of the Empire where there are valuable and important forests, has been frustrated by the strong opposition of the natives, who understanding hardly, if at all, the peril of their country arising from the destruction of their forests, cannot bring themselves to surrender their individual rights for the protection of the forests".
He was frustrated by the destructive habit of burning forest to clear it for agricultural use and deeply concerned by the ecological impact of the growing population.

Later career

In 1922 Chipp returned to England to take up an appointment as assistant director of the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew. In his talks to visitors to the gardens, his enthusiasm for ecological "improvements" through introduction of more useful specias and techniques shone through. He believed without question in the value of changing land use to increase production and would have seen little value in conserving untouched reserves.
He was known for his energy combined with careful attention to detail, for his care to ensure that the gardens were always well maintained, and for his interest in the welfare of Student Gardeners.

Chipp gained a central position among ecologists as secretary of the British Empire Vegetation Committee, the Imperial Botanical Conference and the fifth International Botanical Congress
International Botanical Congress
International Botanical Congress is a large-scale meeting of botanists in all scientific fields, from all over the world. Authorized by the International Association of Botanical and Mycological Societies , congresses are held every six years with the venue circulating around the world. The XVIII...

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He was one of the developers and promoters of a "systems" approach to ecological research. The 1926 Aims and methods in the study of vegetation which he and Arthur Tansley
Arthur Tansley
Sir Arthur George Tansley FRS was an English botanist who was a pioneer in the science of ecology. He obtained his degree in Biological Science in 1896, with specialization in botany and zoology. From the start, he was much influenced by the Danish plant ecologist Eugenius Warming. He championed...

 edited for the British Empire vegetation committee was extremely influential not just in defining ecological methods but in highlighting the need for a complete inventory of the empire's "vegetational assets". With this information, it would be possible to efficiently manage the vast natural resources of the empire.

In the late autumn of 1928 the Empire Marketing Board
Empire Marketing Board
The Empire Marketing Board was formed in May 1926 by the Colonial Secretary Leo Amery to promote inter-Empire trade and to persuade consumers to 'Buy Empire'...

 made a grant to Kew which enabled Chipp to pay an official visit overseas.
Chipp visited the Sudan, then part of the British Empire, where he explored the Imatong Mountains
Imatong Mountains
The Imatong Mountains are located in the southeast of South Sudan in the state of Eastern Equatoria, and extend into Uganda. Mount Kinyeti is the highest mountain of the range at , and the highest in the whole of South Sudan....

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In February 1929 he climbed Mount Kinyeti, the highest mountain of the range at 3187 metres (10,456 ft).
Apart from a visit by R. Good to Gebel Marra which had obtained a few specimens, Chipp was the first European botanist to investigate the mountains of this region.
Among other specimens, he collected Coreopsis chippii
Bidens chippii
Bidens chippii is a species of flowering plant in the family Asteraceae. It belongs to the genus Bidens.The plant was at first named Coreopsis chippii after the botanist Thomas Ford Chipp. Chipp found it on 11 February 1929 growing in scrub at an altitude of on top of Mount Kinyeti in the Imatong...

near the summit.
On his return, Chipp was faced with a huge administrative workload connected with the gardens, the Botanical Congress and a directory of botanists worldwide that he was helping to prepare. He died prematurely of a heart attack at the end of June 1931, at the age of forty four.
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