Ralph Gilmore Halliday BSc (Hons), PhD

Born in Dumfries, Scotland in 1941, Ralph was educated at Dumfries Academy and the University of Glasgow, where he earned a BSc and PhD in Zoology. In 1966 he and his wife emigrated to Canada, where Ralph had been awarded a Post Doctoral Fellowship with the Fisheries Research Board at the Biological Station in St Andrews, NB, later becoming a permanent member of staff as a research scientist.

His work on the dynamics of marine fish populations led him to involvement first with ICNAF (International Commission for the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries) where he contributed to its research and statistics group. He was also very active in ICNAF’s successor NAFO (Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization), an international body giving scientific advice to ensure conservation and sustainable use of fisheries resources. As chief of the Marine Fish Division, Scotia Fundy Region, he moved to the Bedford Institute of Oceanography in Dartmouth in 1976, where he worked until his retirement in 2003. He served a term as Chairman of CAFSAC (Canadian Atlantic Fisheries Scientific Advisory Council) but a few years before retirement left administrative positions to return to research, which was what he loved. He was awarded both the Queen’s Silver and Golden Jubilee medals for services to Canadian fisheries. After retirement he and his good friend and colleague of many years Allenby Pinhorn, also a retired research scientist, collaborated on several scientific papers, both of them reluctant to give up the research they enjoyed so much.

Ralph is survived by his wife Anne, his daughters Ruth Halliday-Hughes (James) and Susan Halliday Mahar (Daryl), and by his grandson Owen Mahar.

Cremation has taken place, and as Ralph wished there will be no funeral.