Martin M. Barnes, ESA Fellow (1991)

Dr. Martin M. Barnes (deceased 22 April 2007), a professor at the University of California, Riverside (UCR), was elected as Fellow in 1991. He received national and international recognition for his basic and applied research on the control of arthropod pests of deciduous orchard and vineyard crops including apples, dates, grapes, almonds, and walnuts. In fact, his first publication, published in 1944 while he still was a graduate student, dealt with the control of the codling moth (Cydia pomonella(L.)), a major pest of apples and pears.

Dr. Barnes was born in Calgary, Alberta, Canada in 1920. He spent his early life on cotton plantations in Arkansas and Louisiana, the ancestral home of the Barnes family. In 1927, the family moved to San Gabriel, CA. Barnes, now a teenager, took summer jobs with Joe Wilcox, an entomologist with the USDA, which started Barnes on a career in entomology. He attended Pasadena City College for two years, University of California, Los Angeles for one year, and then entered Univerity of California, Berkeley (UCB), graduating with highest honors in 1941. He began his graduate studies at UCB but transferred to Cornell University in March 1942 to enter a Ph.D. program. His doctoral research focused on insect pest management in apple orchards of western New York. He earned a Ph.D. in 1946, married Julia Butts, and moved to Riverside, CA, where he began his career with the Citrus Experiment Station and remained for the next 45 years; he also held the rank of professor at UCR.

Dr. Barnes worked on many problems in entomology and plant pathology but concentrated on the practical needs of agriculture. Much of his research (often in collaboration with graduate students) dealt with the codling moth. This research included morphology of the sex pheromone gland of females, sense organs of the mouthparts, susceptibility to insecticides, insecticidal control, detection using synthetic sex pheromones, and formation of host races. He developed IPM control strategies for this pest that are still in use today. He authored 70 research papers, several book chapters, and numerous technical and popular publications.

Barnes served the ESA in several capacities including as a member of the Governing Board, chair of section F, member and chair of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Economic Entomology, member of several national committees, and as a committee member, program chair, and president of the Pacific Branch of the ESA. He was elected an Honorary Member of the ESA in 1996 and as Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1957.     

(updated August, 2011)