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| BNHS | |
|---|---|
| Name | BNHS |
| Caption | Bombay Natural History Society building |
| Formation | 1883 |
| Founder | S.P. Dear; Herman Salomon |
| Type | Non-governmental organization |
| Headquarters | Mumbai |
| Region served | India; South Asia |
BNHS
The Bombay Natural History Society is a long-established conservation and scientific society founded in 1883 in Bombay, now Mumbai, that brought together naturalists, collectors, administrators and scholars from across British India and later independent India. It has been associated with prominent figures such as S. M. Edwardes, E. H. Aitken, R. L. Holdsworth, and Salim Ali and has collaborated with institutions including the Zoological Survey of India, Wildlife Institute of India, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, Conservation International, and the World Wide Fund for Nature. Over its history it has influenced fieldwork associated with expeditions to the Western Ghats, Sundarbans, Andaman Islands, Himalayas, and Western India and produced a corpus of regional biodiversity knowledge used by agencies like the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change and academic centres such as the University of Mumbai and the Indian Institute of Science.
Founded during the late Victorian era, the society emerged amid colonial natural history networks connecting Kew Gardens, Natural History Museum, London, and the British Museum (Natural History). Early meetings included officers of the Indian Civil Service, surgeons from the Royal Army Medical Corps, and amateur naturalists who contributed specimens to collections and records that fed catalogues like those of the Bombay Natural History Society Magazine. In the early twentieth century, members mounted surveys of avifauna and mammals concurrent with work by Allan Octavian Hume and later documented species described by taxonomists such as Thomas C. Jerdon and William Henry Sykes. The mid-20th century saw leading ornithologists including Salim Ali shape modern Indian ornithology through field guides and atlases, while post-independence collaborations linked the society with Wildlife Protection Act, 1972 implementations and protected area designations such as Sanjay Gandhi National Park.
The society's mission encompasses species inventorying, habitat conservation, policy advisement, and public natural history education, partnering with organizations like the BirdLife International partnership, International Union for Conservation of Nature, United Nations Environment Programme, and national agencies such as the Forest Survey of India. Activities include field surveys in biogeographic regions like the Indo-Gangetic Plain, Deccan Plateau, and Northeast India, advisory inputs to conservation planning for sites like the Kaziranga National Park and the Gir National Park, and campaigns targeting threats documented also by research from the Centre for Science and Environment and the National Centre for Biological Sciences.
Research has produced faunal checklists, red-data assessments, and long-term monitoring projects focusing on taxa ranging from birds and mammals to reptiles and butterflies. Collaborative research with the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education, Botanical Survey of India, and the Wildlife Conservation Society has supported conservation actions for species cited in regional assessments such as the IUCN Red List and national lists like those under the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972. The society has been active in habitat restoration projects in landscapes including the Western Ghats, Deccan Traps, and coastal mangroves of the Maharashtra coast, and has contributed to mitigation strategies for human–wildlife conflict that draw on case studies from Ranthambore National Park and Periyar National Park.
Educational programming targets schools, universities, and community stakeholders using lectures, field workshops, citizen science initiatives, and training courses run in collaboration with entities such as the Indian Museum, Sukuma Trust, Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment, and regional NGOs. Outreach includes citizen-science platforms that complement national efforts like the Biodiversity Act inventories and initiatives aligned with observances such as World Environment Day and International Day for Biological Diversity. Public engagement has included exhibitions featuring specimens from collections linked historically to collectors like F. R. Godfrey, guided birdwatching walks around urban green spaces in Mumbai, and school naturalist programs modeled after international programmes such as the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch.
The society publishes periodicals and monographs that have served as primary references for South Asian natural history, including long-running journals and handbooks used by researchers at the Centre for Ecological Sciences and curators at the Natural History Museum, London. Key outputs include annotated species lists, regional field guides authored by figures like Salim Ali and S. Dillon Ripley, and thematic reports disseminated to bodies such as the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. Its archival material, specimen catalogues, and photographic records inform taxonomic revisions produced in journals like Journal of Bombay Natural History Society and regional natural history bulletins.
Membership historically comprised colonial administrators, military officers, and professional naturalists and today includes researchers, conservationists, and citizen naturalists from institutions such as the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, and various state forest departments. Governance involves an elected council, committees on ornithology, mammalogy, herpetology, and entomology, and partnerships with advisory bodies including the National Biodiversity Authority and state-level biodiversity boards.
Facilities include a headquarters with archives, specimen collections, a reference library, and offices used for coordination of fieldwork and training. Notable centres of activity have been linked to historic expeditions to the Western Ghats and research nodes collaborating with the Himalayan Environmental Studies and Conservation Organization, regional herbaria such as the Blatter Herbarium, and zoological collections in museums like the Asiatic Society of Mumbai.
Category:Natural history societies