Horace Donisthorpe

Horace St. John Kelly Donisthorpe (March 17, 1870–April 22, 1951) was an eccentric British myrmecologist and coleopterist, memorable in part for his enthusiastic championing of the renaming of the genus Lasius after him as Donisthorpea, and for his many claims of discovering new species of beetles and ants.

Books by Donisthorpe

• The Coleoptera of the Isle of Wight. Published in 1906 by the Leicester Literary and Philosophical Society. The supplementary sixth volume was compiled with W. W. Fowler to the latter's Coleoptera of the British Isles in 1913;
• British Ants: their life histories and classification. First published in 1915, this book was reviewed and republished in 1927, and was the first major book ever written on British ants. Although the first edition contained all the species known at the time (and one, Leptothorax corticalis which was lated found to be erroneous), the second edition contained the addition of Lasius brunneus, a small, arboreal ants of the Lasius mixtusb group found principally in orchards in the home counties. The 1927 edition was, however, too early for any mention of Strongylodus testacious, which Donisthorpe discovered (and described as a new species!) in the New Forest several years later.
• The Guests of British Ants. Published in 1927, the same year as the revision of British Ants: their life histories and classification took place. This book deals with myrmecophiles of British ants, some of them ants themselves (e.g. Formicoxenus and Anergates). It also mentions and debunks theories regarding the effect that the presence of a species of beetle (of the genus Atemeles) has on the number of pseudogynes in colonies of the larger formica (ant) species.
• An Annotated List of the Additions to the British Coleopterous Fauna. Published in 1931, the title serves to be self-explanatory.
• A Preliminary List of the Coleoptera of Windsor Forest. Published in 1939, Donisthorpe dedicated the book to the memory of Florence Jane Kirk, his constant companion on collecting trips. In it he writes: "In memory of Jane Kirk, whose patience, skill, and unfailing energy were of invaluable help in attaining the results set forth in these pages." The book consists of a preamble detailing the various features of Windsor Great Park and its ancient forests, and a list of the many hundreds of Coleoptera Donisthorpe collected there, with brief habitat details for each species.