Carrington Bonsor Williams

Carrington Bonsor Williams FRS (7 October 1889 – 12 July 1981) better known as C. B. Williams or just "C.B." to friends, was an English entomologist and ecologist. He contributed to studies on insect migration, statistical approaches to ecology and biogeography. In Africa, Williams met Reginald Ernest Moreau, who was an accountant in Egypt with an interest in birds. He introduced Moreau into scientific techniques and helped his transfer to Amani. Moreau later became a pioneer who developed theories on life-history, influencing David Lack with his studies on clutch size in birds. From 1945 to 1946 Williams was President of the Association of Applied Biologists.

Insect migration The study of butterfly migration was a passion for C. B. Williams. He made uncountable observations himself during his years in the Tropics and he had colleagues all over the world making new observations. He analysed and published the results in a long series of publications and became a world-leading authority on the subject. Through his research, he was able to shed light on many of the problems, which he had first formulated in his 1930 thesis. He published a much enhanced account on the subject in 1958.

Statistical ecology From 1932 to 1955, he headed the entomology department at the Rothamsted Experimental Station. When he joined the staff in 1932, Sir John Russell was the director. Russell had earlier invited R. A. Fisher and Williams was able to study quantitative aspects of insect populations. Williams became one of the pioneers of the statistical study of biodiversity patterns. For example, he showed that Charles Elton's observation that the species-to-genus ratio was lower on islands than on mainlands could be expected from chance alone and hence that Elton's interpretation (competitive exclusion) was redundant (which had already been shown three decades earlier by Alvar Palmgren and Arthur Maillefer). In his 1964 book, "Patterns in the Balance of Nature", Williams gave a still valuable overview of this discipline.

With Fisher, Williams was able to establish patterns in the diversity and numbers of insects caught in light traps. He noticed that logarithmic patterns were widespread, an idea which was later developed by other ecologists like Frank W. Preston. Williams used this pattern to predict the number of head lice on people using data on counts of lice from prisoners in a South Indian jail. Williams calculated that the number of persons with only one louse must be 107 and the actual was 106 and he wrote so Nature was only one wrong.

He continued to work after his retirement on many aspects of insect ecology.

Miscellaneous C. B. Williams served as president of several learned societies, e.g. the Association of Applied Biologists, the British Ecological Society and of the Royal Entomological Society of London. In 1954, C. B. Williams was made a fellow of the Royal Society.