Utteridge, Timothy M. A.
Job Title
Senior Botanist, South-East Asia Regional Team
Department
Herbarium, Library, Art and Archives
Section
Regional Teams
Science Teams:
Joined Kew:
1999Foreign Language(s):
Conversational IndonesianQualifications & Appointments
BSc (Hons) Applied Biology, University of Greenwich 1993
MSc (Distinction) Plant and Fungal Taxonomy, University of Reading 1994
PhD, University of Hong Kong, 1998
Prospect Union Representative
Role
Taxonomic and floristic research in South East Asia, especially Primulaceae and Stemonuraceae; field guides to Thailand, Borneo and New Guinea; floristics and conservation of New Guinea; organiser of the Tropical ID Course.
Systematic research on the families Primulaceae, especially the genus Maesa, and the Icacinaceae, and Stemonuraceae. Maesa is a taxonomically complex genus with its centre in South East Asia, and work includes researching species variation in the region and will result in the production of floristic treatments. The Icacinaceae were poorly known and work has been undertaken on generic limits, as well as undertaking floristic research in the newly segregated family Stemonuraceae.
Also researching several other families from South East Asia, especially from New Guinea, describing new species etc., including the Annonaceae, Hamamelidaceae, Rubiaceae, Pittosporaceae, and Scrophulariaceae.
Member of the Mt Jaya project, exploring New Guinea’s highest peak, and involved in fieldwork in the region, writing taxonomic accounts, and editing the book and seeing it through to publication. Research into collecting patterns on Mt Jaya and the island of New Guinea as a whole, and their effects on planning botanical inventories and databasing, and setting conservation priorities in New Guinea.
The South East Asia team has successfully participated in several Darwin Initiative grants. Including, Papuan Plant Diversity, Field Guide to the Forest Trees of Southern Thailand, an inventory of conservation areas of Sabah, and monitoring a lowland forest restoration project in Sumatra.
Approach is that of a generalist botanist with a broad knowledge of the flora of South-East Asia and Indochina, with special interest in New Guinea, undertaking identification of incoming herbarium material. The South East Asia team organises and runs an annual Tropical Plant Identification Course, which has been very well received since its launch in 2003; and is currently preparing a handbook based on the course content.
Projects
- Biodiversity inventory and monitoring to conserve critically threatened lowland forest in Sumatra
- UK Darwin Initiative Papuan Plant Diversity - COMPLETED 2006
- Assessing and conserving plant diversity in commercially managed tropical rainforests in Sabah - COMPLETED 2010.
- Taxonomic research on ecologically important plant families in Southeast Asia
- Field Guide to the Trees of Southern Thailand
- Guide to the Alpine and Subalpine Flora of Mt Jaya - COMPLETED 2006
- Interactive Key to the Malesian Seed Plants
- The Dye-Plants of Indonesia
- Tropical Plant Families: An Identification Handbook
- Vegetation mapping in the Geelvink Bay Papua, Indonesia
Selected Recent Publications
Utteridge, T.M.A. (2011). A revision of the genus Medusanthera (Stemonuraceae, Icacinaceae s.l.) Kew Bulletin 66: 49-81.
de Kok, R.P.J. and Utteridge, T.M.A. (2010). A Field Guide to the plants of East Sabah. Kew: Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
Utteridge, T.M.A. and Schori, M. (2009). Stemonurus corrugatus (Stemonuraceae, Icacinaceae s.l.) a new species from Sarawak: Kew Bulletin 64: 327-331.
Marsh, S.T., Brummitt, N.A., de Kok, R.P.J. and Utteridge, T.M.A. (2009). Large-scale patterns of plant diversity and conservation priorities in South East Asia. Blumea 54: 103–108.
- Johns, R.J., Edwards, P.J., Utteridge, T.M.A. and Hopkins, H.F. (2006) A Guide to the Alpine and Subalpine Flora of Mount Jaya. Kew: Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
Selected Earlier Publications
Utteridge, T.M.A., Nagamasu, H., Teo, S.P., White, L.C., & Gasson, P. (2005). Sleumeria (Icacinaceae): A New Genus from Northern Borneo. Systematic Botany 30(3): 635–643.
Utteridge, T.M.A. & Saunders, R.M.K. (2004). The genus Maesa (Maesaceae) in the Philippines. Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society 145: 17–43.
- Utteridge, T.M.A. (2001). A new species of Medusanthera Seem. (Icacinaceae) from New Guinea: Medusanthera inaequalis Utteridge. Contributions to the flora of Mt Jaya, IV. Kew Bulletin 56: 233–237.
- Utteridge, T.M.A. & Saunders, R.M.K. (2001). Sexual Dimorphism and Functional Dioecy in Maesa perlarius and M. japonica (Maesaceae/Myrsinaceae). Biotropica 33(2): 368–374.
- Utteridge, T.M.A. (2000). Revision of the genus Cyathostemma (Annonaceae). Blumea 45: 377–396.
