Miguel Alvarez del Toro

Miguel Carlos Francisco Álvarez del Toro ( born August 23, 1917 in Colima, Colima; † August 2, 1996 in Ciudad de México ) was a Mexican zoologist.

Life

Álvarez del Toro grew up in Colima, where he was enthusiastic as a child for the local fauna. In his youth he moved with his family to the capital. There he worked in the late 1930s as a taxidermist at the newly established Museo de la Flora y la Fauna Nacionales in the forest of Chapultepec and was, despite his status as a young self-taught, even deputy director. Following the resignation of the old director in 1941, he left the museum. For the American Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia, he gained during this time bird species at various locations in Mexico and made this work his first rainforest excursion to Oaxaca.

In 1942 he got a job in Chiapas as a taxidermist at the Museo de Historia Natural, that wanted to set up in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, the then governor of the state, Rafael Pascacio Gamboa. First collected Álvarez and certain vertebrates for the collection of the Museum opened in late 1942 and the planned zoo. In 1944, Elisha Parker, the director of the museum died, Álvarez became his successor. By the end of his life he remained director of the Instituto de Historia Natural del Gobierno del Estado de Chiapas.

Álvarez del Toro taught at the Colegio de Ciencias y Artes de Chiapas, and later at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. In Chiapas, he played an essential role in nature conservation; six of the eleven protected areas of the state go back to his initiative. In addition, he was for many years director of the jungle zoo of Tuxtla Gutierrez and developed its unusual concept, in which the animals live freely and the " most dangerous species of the world," the human visitors, are " locked in" and guarded. Since the move in 1980 to El Zapotal, a forest area in the southeast of the city, this zoo bears his honor the name Zoológico Miguel Álvarez del Toro ( ZOOMAT ).

Álvarez del Toro has published over 40 essays on Mexican bird species, including the dwarf Finfoot ( Heliornis fulica ) and the Zapfenguan ( Oreophasis derbianus ). He has published seven books, including his most important publication, which was first published in 1971 Compendium Las aves de Chiapas ( Birds of Chiapas ).

Among the species named after him include Pulex alvarezi (1958), Lepidophyma alvarezi (1975 ), Trogolaphysa Toroid (1985 ), Crypto Triton alvarezdeltoroi (1987 ), Coniophanes alvarezi (1990 ), Anolis alvarezdeltoroi (1996) and Ceratozamia alvarezii (1999).

Since 1947 he was a member of the American Ornithologists ' Union. In 1989 he was awarded the J. Paul Getty Wildlife Conservation Prize of the World Wildlife Fund, he was awarded the Global 500 Award in 1992. From the Universidad Autónoma Chapingo (1992) and the Universidad Autónoma de Chiapas (1993 ), he was awarded an honorary doctorate.