Lovis, Professor John Donald

• Professor John Lovis

• John Lovis

• John Donald Lovis

Studied botany at the Queen Mary College at the University of London. After graduation, moved to University of Leeds, completed a PhD on Apslenium trichomanes with Prof. Irene Manton. Received a DSIR Postgraduate Fellowship to study in New Zealand for a year where he collected 75% of the native fern speices. He completed his PhD in 1958 and was appointed to a lectureship at the University of Leeds.

Over the next 20 years, Lovis would continue to study the complexities of evolution through hybridisation of Asplenium. He was the first to artificially reconstruct a naturally occurring polyploid fern, and later was able to synthesise a new and artificial alloploid species unknown in the wild. In 1977, published 'Evolutionary patterns and processes in ferns' in Advances in Botanical Research, which summarised all of his cytology work in ferns to date. 1978, he was awarded a degree of Doctor of Science from the University of London for his contributions to the understanding of fern evolution.

1977, Lovis became the Professor and Chair of Botany at University of Canterbury (New Zealand). There he took an interest in fossil botany. He led regular student trips to the Cass field station and other parts of the South Island and collected intensively from the plant groups he was researching or just interested in.

Lovis was a man of many talents and interests. In his younger days quite the athlete in a variety of sports: bowling, cricket, and hockey. Loved learning about wine and ran a wine appreciation courses at Canterbury University's Department of Continuing Education. He loved photography, rugby, classical music, cheese, and Ceylon tea.

After his death in 2017, his daughter donated his whole collection to Te Papa (New Zealand).

University of Leeds
University of Canterbury (New Zealand)

Created - April 2026, C.Kemnitz

• Engels

• Latijn

Te Papa Tongarewa (Museum of New Zealand) (n.d.). John Lovis Herbarium. [online] <https://www.tepapa.govt.nz/. Available at: https://collections.tepapa.govt.nz/topic/11139>

British Pteridological Society (2017) John Donald Lovis. In BPS Bulletin, vol. 8, no. 4, p. 373-380. Available at: https://archive.org/details/bulletin8brita/page/372/mode/2up

Image; By Tony 1212 - Own work, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=146203801