Claude Wardlaw

Claude Wilson Wardlaw (4 February 1901 - 16 December 1985) was a British botanist, who specialised in diseases of the banana.

Career

Born on 4 February 1901, Wardlaw was educated at Paisley Grammar School, before studying botany at Glasgow University. After gaining a PhD and DSc, he taught botany at the University.

His professional specialism in bananas began in 1928, when he was appointed Pathologist for Banana Research at the Imperial College of Tropical Agriculture in Trinidad. His focus was researching the Panama Disease that had affected plantations in the West Indies. His book Green Havoc (1935) describes his investigations. In the same year, he published another book, Diseases of the Banana, which was republished in an expanded edition as Banana Diseases in 1961 and 1972.

While in Trinidad, Wardlaw was also involved with the work of the Low Temperature Research Station, where he was appointed officer-in-chief in 1933, as well as researching various tropical fruits of the region.