LACK, DAVID LAMBERT

born July 16, 1910, London, Eng. died March 12, 1973, Oxford, Oxfordshire British ornithologist, best known as the author of The Life of the Robin (1943) and other works that popularized natural science. Lack was educated at Magdalene College, Cambridge (M.A., 1936), and taught zoology in Devon from 1933 to 1938, when he joined an expedition to the Galpagos Islands. He served in the British army during World War II and in 1945 was appointed director of the Edward Grey Institute of Field Ornithology in Oxford. He was also a Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, from 1963. Lack is particularly noted for his argument that density of animal populations is more important than other factors (such as weather) in determining animal distribution and number (The Natural Regulation of Animal Numbers, 1954). His other works include Darwin's Finches: An Essay on the General Biological Theory of Evolution (1947, rev. ed. 1983), Ecological Isolation in Birds (1971), and Island Biology (1976), on the land birds of Jamaica.