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UC Berkeley ornithology curator and bird expert, Ned Johnson, dies at age 70
Wednesday June 18, 2003ORINDA, Calif. (AP) Ned Johnson, a renowned ornithologist and curator of the UC Berkeley Museum of Invertebrate Biology, has died, the campus announced Wednesday. He was 70.
Johnson died June 11 at his Orinda home after a long battle with cancer, UC Berkeley confirmed.
Over the years Johnson collected more than 7,200 bird specimens, most of which are at the university's museum and available for study. Johnson's partner and close colleague at the museum, Carla Cicero, remembered Johnson as having extensive understanding of the region's birds.
``His knowledge of the distribution and natural history of birds in Western North America, and his scientific contributions to the ornithology of the region, are unsurpassed among living ornithologists,'' Cicero said.
Johnson published his first paper on birds at age 17 and at the time of his death he was working on a book on geographic variation and speciation in birds.
He was considered an expert on owls, sapsuckers, flycatchers, vireos and Sage Sparrows.
Johnson was just weeks away from a planned retirement. He joined the faculty at UC Berkeley in 1961.
Johnson is survived by his partner, Carla Cicero, of Moraga; three daughters; one son; and three grandchildren.
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