Ray Perry: the father of rangeland science in Australia

Beginning in 1947, Ray Perry’s forty-year career at CSIRO was distinguished by his advocacy for coordinated research by multi-disciplinary teams of scientists into the ecology and management of Australia’s rangelands. With more than ten years commitment to CSIRO’s North Australian Regional Surveys, he was well qualified to highlight the deficiencies in the land management he observed. Experience in US university rangeland science schools convinced him that Australia could do better by initiating scientifically-based management. CSIRO established a Rangelands Research Unit, led by Perry, in 1969. He was an early convert to the value of science communication, remote sensing, systems analysis, modelling, and incorporation of socio-economics into land use research. He worked collegially with many organisations both internationally and within Australia to achieve science-based land resource management. Perry went on to become Chief of two CSIRO Divisions, Land Resources Management and Groundwater Research, where he successfully applied his innovative thinking to a broad suite of programs. However, without doubt, his greatest contribution was to the establishment of rangeland science in Australia.