CON O'ROURKE graduated from UCD in General Agriculture and trained in microbiology and plant pathology, working for Teagasc for forty years. He has been President of the Institute of Biology of Ireland, Chairman of the Science Committee of the Royal Dublin Society, and served on various committees of the Royal Irish Academy, while organizing natural history courses as Gaeilge in the Aran Islands for trainee teachers, students and tourists. In 1990 his bilingual natural history video was issued, complemented by a poster on local flora, Blatha Arann, in 1993. He has edited several scientific publications.