Alexander Clifford Beauglehole


Alexander Clifford Beauglehole was an Australian farmer, botanist, plant collector and naturalist.

Life

Beauglehole was born in Gorae West, a rural locality near Portland in the Shire of Glenelg, in south-western Victoria. He attended Gorae state primary school but left after attaining his Qualifying Certificate to help his parents on the farm. He soon began making botanical surveys of the Portland area, as well as engaging in other natural history activities such as the study of Australian native bees, surveys of bone deposits in caves and the examination of beach-washed seabirds.
In the 1940s he discovered a new triggerplant species, Stylidium beaugleholei, and set up a herbarium which grew to eventually contain over 23,000 specimens. Beauglehole continued to work the family farm until 1968, after which contracting to carry out botanical surveys in national parks and for the Victorian Land Conservation Council became his principal occupation. He published on a wide variety of natural history subjects. From 1979 to 1984 he produced 13 volumes of The Distribution and Conservation of Vascular Plants in Victoria, written to cover the 73 study areas of the Victorian Conservation Council.

Honours and awards