Obituary
Wildlife champion Dr Andy Tasker

Buy photos » Wildlife champion Dr Andy Tasker, who has died aged 60. (s)

TRIBUTES have been paid to former Warwickshire Wildlife Trust chairman Dr Andy Tasker, who has died after a short illness aged 60.

Dr Tasker, who lived locally and is survived by wife Linda and sons Paul and Stephen, was a vocal supporter of Warwickshire's wildlife and natural heritage for many years.

Back in 2005, ahead of the general election that year, he called in Observer for people to vote for a candidate committed to conservation, saying: “Five years into the new Millennium, the need for strong political leadership on the environment has never been greater. Despite the starkest warning yet from scientists about climate change, most new buildings still don’t incorporate energy saving technology.”

Later that year he spoke out against possible expansion of Coventry Airport, telling a public inquiry at Leamington Town Hall it would have an “appalling” effect on the area's nature reserves.

And he hit local and national headlines in 2010 when – speaking in a personal capacity rather than for the wildlife trust - he launched an astonishing attack on daffodils, calling for them to be banished from the countryside via his own website www.ihatedaffodils.org.uk.

Dr Tasker claimed garden daffodils caused damage to the environment and made the countryside look like a garden - comparing it to putting lipstick on the Mona Lisa.

Dr Tasker was from May 2011 until the end of his life the director of the Globe Program, a US based but worldwide environmental education project, encouraging children in schools to measure their local environment, and make their findings available to everyone using the internet.

A statement from its interim director, Dr Jack Fellow, read: “The Globe Program community has lost a true visionary.

“Andy cared so deeply for Globe. He left an indelible mark on where it is headed. Our primary goal is to ensure his vision for the Program is carried out.”

Tributes were also paid on Twitter with one person writing: “Sad to hear that Dr Andy Tasker has passed away - a great friend of Warwickshire's natural heritage.”

The Globe statement added the Tasker family had advised any donations in honour of Dr Tasker be made to the Globe Program or Cancer Research.