The NBN Trust is very sad to note the passing of Trevor James on Friday 5 June 2020.
Trevor worked for the NBN Trust for many years, starting in 2001 as the National Societies & Schemes Project Officer and continuing as Development Officer until 2013, when he retired. He then worked as a consultant for the Trust for a year until 2014.
In this time, Trevor organised the annual NBN Conference always ensuring a topical theme and great line up of speakers. Such was his dedication that in (we believe) 2003, faced with a tube strike, Trevor, carrying all (around 100!) of the delegate packs, walked from Kings Cross to the Natural History Museum – which is over 4 miles – to ensure the Conference started on time, with all the relevant material in place!
Trevor worked for the NBN Trust in its formative years and was instrumental in encouraging National Societies and Schemes to share data and in providing a link between them, LERCs and the NBN. His personal involvement in biological recording over many decades meant that he had an understanding of the issues and opportunities on all sides and he was incredibly well respected as a result. Trevor was made an Honorary Member of the NBN Trust in 2007.
He was a county recorder for over 40 years and set the benchmark for recording animal and plant life species in Hertfordshire and beyond. Trevor personally collated more than one million biological records, including 90,000 plants and 20,000 beetle genera. He also published two distinguished books, ‘Flora of Hertfordshire’ in 2009, and ‘Beetles of Hertfordshire‘ in 2018 – the latter of which was the first of its kind in the UK, with atlas maps and text as well as photos of species.
Trevor was presented with the Gilbert White Award for Recording Wildlife in the 2018 NBN Awards, in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the taxonomic and geographic understanding of plants and beetles, both at county level and nationally.
He was awarded a British Empire Medal in the New Year’s Honours list in January 2020. This is awarded for a ‘hands-on’ service to the local community and Trevor was recognised for his services to nature conservation in Hertfordshire, after dedicating the majority of his adult life to recording the county’s plant and beetle species.
Trevor will be remembered by the NBN Trust for his encyclopedic knowledge, balanced viewpoints, willingness to get involved, however the work dictated, for his endless energy and enthusiasm, his gentle manner and his friendly, often cheeky, laugh! RIP Trevor, you will be sorely missed, but remembered fondly.
Our thoughts are with his wife Chris and son Edward at this sad time.