Charles Fleming (ornithologist)
Sir Charles Alexander Fleming, KBE, FRS, FRSNZ, FRAOU was a New Zealand geologist, ornithologist, avian palaeontologist and environmentalist. He spent the last twenty years of his life studying the evolution and systematics of New Zealand cicadas.
He was active in the Save Manapouri Campaign, was a spokesperson for Native Forest Action Council and the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society of New Zealand. In 1974 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union.
In 1988 the Royal Society of New Zealand established the Charles Fleming Award which is awarded to individuals who have achieved distinction in the protection, maintenance, management, improvement, or understanding of the environment.
In 1997, Trevor H. Worthy commemorated Charles Fleming in the species' epithet of the prehistoric rail Pleistorallus flemingi from the mid-Pleistocene of New Zealand.
In the 1964 New Year Honours, Fleming was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire. He was promoted to Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1977 New Year Honours, for services to science and conservation.
