Derek Reid
British mycologist (1927-2006)
Derek Agutter Reid (2 September 1927 – 18 January 2006) was an English mycologist.
Background and education
Reid was born in Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire, the son of a picture-framer. He was educated at Cedars School and the University of Hull, where he studied geology and botany. He gained his PhD from the University of London in 1964, for a thesis (later published) on stipitate stereoid fungi.
Mycological career and travels
In 1951, he became assistant to Dr R.W.G. Dennis, head of mycology at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. On his retirement in 1975, Derek Reid took over his position and remained at Kew till his own retirement in 1987.
Derek Reid was a naturalist and enthusiastic field mycologist, leading regular fungus forays in his native Bedfordshire for over 40 years, as well as tutoring fungus identification courses at Field Studies Centres, and evening classes at the University of London. He published the popular field guide to British fungi; Mushrooms and Toadstools: A Kingfisher Guide, in 1980. He was also able to travel far more widely than his predecessors at Kew, visiting and collecting fungi in continental Europe, the United States, the West Indies, Australia, and South Africa. His particular interest in South African fungi led to several joint papers with his fellow mycologist Prof.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Derek Reid” as british mycologist (1927-2006). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 3, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4392572. VIAF identifies the subject as 65129520. The Library of Congress control number is n80136218. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1927, 2006, 1964 and 1951.
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This entry incorporates text from “Derek Reid” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.