Ronald Gordon Fennah (1910 – 19 August 1987) was an English entomologist who specialised in the systematics of the

Fulgoroidea A planthopper is any insect in the infraorder Fulgoromorpha, in the suborder Auchenorrhyncha, a group exceeding 12,500 described species worldwide. The name comes from their remarkable resemblance to leaves and other plants of their environment ...

and worked in the Caribbean Islands and at the Commonwealth Institute of Entomology. Fennah was born in

Ludlow Ludlow ( ) is a market town and civil parish in Shropshire (district), Shropshire, England. It is located south of Shrewsbury and north of Hereford, on the A49 road (Great Britain), A49 road which bypasses the town. The town is near the conf ...

and graduated from

Cambridge University The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

after which he worked at the Imperial College of Tropical Agriculture in Trinidad. He later became an entomologist in the Trinidad Department of Agriculture where he worked on the pests of citrus, cococa, and sugarcane. He examined the toxicity of DDT by ingesting and applying it on his own skin in 1944. Fennah moved to London to work at the Commonwealth Institute of Entomology in 1958, becoming its director in 1969 and retiring in 1975. He worked on the systematics of the

Auchenorrhyncha The Auchenorrhyncha suborder of the Hemiptera contains most of the familiar members of what was called the "Homoptera" – groups such as cicadas, leafhoppers, treehoppers, planthoppers, and spittlebugs. The aphids and scale insects are the o ...

and received an Sc.D. from Cambridge University in 1967.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fennah, Ronald Gordon 1910 births 1987 deaths English entomologists People from Ludlow Alumni of the University of Cambridge 20th-century English zoologists Scientists from Shropshire