Albert Schwartz (September 13, 1923 – October 18, 1992) was an American zoologist who worked extensively with the herpetofauna of Florida and the West Indies, and later with butterflies.[1][2] One magazine article once dubbed him as one of the "Kings of West Indian Anole Taxonomy".[3]
Albert Schwartz | |
|---|---|
| Born | September 13, 1923 Cincinnati, Ohio, United States |
| Died | October 18, 1992 (aged 69) Miami, Florida, U.S. |
| Education | |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Herpetology |
Career
editSchwartz obtained his PhD from the University of Michigan in mammalogy in 1952. Already at that time, he had a keen interest in amphibians and reptiles, as well as in warmer climates.[1] Schwartz spent most of his professional working life at Miami-Dade Community College;[1][2] he was also supported by a family trust, which he used to fund his own activities as well as field expeditions by others. He was a Research Associate of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History,[4] and also an associate of the Florida Museum of Natural History, the National Museum of Natural History (Smithsonian Institution), and the Museo Nacional de Historia Natural, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.[5] Starting in 1954, he worked extensively in Cuba, and described numerous frogs[1] as well as three anole species from there.[3] After the revolution in Cuba, he shifted his attention to Hispaniola,[1] where he again described numerous frog species[1] and five anoles.[3] In the late 1970s, when Schwartz saw the number of new amphibians and reptiles he could describe from the West Indies diminishing, he shifted his attention to butterflies.[1]
Legacy
editSchwartz published 230 papers on West Indian biology. 80 of the amphibian and reptile species he had described were recognized as valid in 1993;[1] he is credited to have described 14% of the entire West Indian herpetofauna.[3] Schwartz is one of the top-10 most productive alpha-taxonomists in herpetology, having described 299 reptiles (species and subspecies) that were still valid in 2018.[6] A number of taxa are named in his honor, including the following:[2][5]
- Anolis schwartzi – may be a subspecies of Anolis wattsi
- Chilabothrus chrysogaster schwartzi
- Eleutherodactylus schwartzi – Schwartz's robber frog, Virgin Islands coqui
- Schwartzius – a subgenus of Eleutherodactylus
- Sphaerodactylus schwartzi – Guantanamo collared sphaero
- Tarentola albertschwartzi – a gecko
- Tropidophis schwartzi – a dwarf boa
- Typhlops schwartzi – Schwartz's worm snake
- Artibeus schwartzi – Schwartz's fruit-eating bat
Works
edit- Schwartz A, Thomas R (1975). A Check-list of West Indian Amphibians and Reptiles. Carnegie Museum of Natural History Special Publication No. 1. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: Carnegie Museum of Natural History. 216 pp.
- Schwartz A, Henderson RW (1991). Amphibians and Reptiles of the West Indies: Descriptions, Distributions, and Natural History. Gainesville, Florida: University Press of Florida. ISBN 0-8130-1049-7.
References
edit- ^ a b c d e f g h Duellman, William E.; Thomas, Richard; Henderson, Robert W. (1993). "Albert Schwartz, 13 Sept. 1923–18 Oct. 1992". Copeia. 1993 (3): 927–932. JSTOR 1447281.
- ^ a b c Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2013). The Eponym Dictionary of Amphibians. Exeter, England: Pelagic Publishing. p. 194. ISBN 978-1-907807-44-2.
- ^ a b c d Glor, Rich (December 19, 2011). "The Kings of West Indian Anole Taxonomy IV: Albert Schwartz". Anole Annals. Retrieved October 8, 2015.
- ^ Various authors (1978). Carnegie Museum of Natural History: 1978 Annual Report. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: Carnegie Museum of Natural History. 56 pp. ("Amphibians & Reptiles", p. 39).
- ^ a b Beolens, Bo; Watkins, Michael; Grayson, Michael (2011). The Eponym Dictionary of Reptiles. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. xiii 296 pp. ISBN 978-1-4214-0135-5. (Schwartz, p. 239)
- ^ Uetz, Peter; Stylianou, Alexandrea (2018). "The original descriptions of reptiles and their subspecies". Zootaxa. 4375 (2): 257–264. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.4375.2.5. ISSN 1175-5334. PMID 29689772.
