Alexander Callender Purdie (25 December 1824 – 24 June 1899) was a New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

 naturalist

Natural history

Natural history is the scientific research of plants or animals, leaning more towards observational rather than experimental methods of study, and encompasses more research published in magazines than in academic journals. Grouped among the natural sciences, natural history is the systematic study...

 and botanist

Botany

Botany, plant science, or plant biology is a branch of biology that involves the scientific study of plant life. Traditionally, botany also included the study of fungi, algae and viruses...

.

Purdie was born in the parish of Fenwick

Fenwick, East Ayrshire

Fenwick is a village in East Ayrshire, Scotland, UK. As of 2001, its population was 863.Fenwick is the terminus of the M77 following its extension which was opened in April 2005, at the beginning of the Kilmarnock bypass....

, East Ayrshire

East Ayrshire

East Ayrshire is one of 32 council areas of Scotland. It borders on to North Ayrshire, East Renfrewshire, South Lanarkshire, South Ayrshire and Dumfries and Galloway...

, Scotland

Scotland

Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

. After his schooling he moved to Glasgow

Glasgow

Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...

 acquiring a trade as a wire worker which he pursued in England and Scotland for several years, while also following his interest in natural history. He emigrated with his wife Ellen in 1860 from Glasgow to New Zealand on the ship “Pladda”, and settled in Dunedin

Dunedin

Dunedin is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand, and the principal city of the Otago Region. It is considered to be one of the four main urban centres of New Zealand for historic, cultural, and geographic reasons. Dunedin was the largest city by territorial land area until...

.

Purdie was a foundation member of both the Otago Institute in 1869, of which he was elected Curator and Librarian in 1873, and the Dunedin Field Naturalists’ Club, in 1872. He also had a long association with the Otago Museum

Otago museum

The Otago Museum is situated in Dunedin, New Zealand. It was founded in 1868 and has a collection of over two million artefacts and specimens from the fields of natural history and ethnography...

, of which he was caretaker or curator, and then with the University of Otago

University of Otago

The University of Otago in Dunedin is New Zealand's oldest university with over 22,000 students enrolled during 2010.The university has New Zealand's highest average research quality and in New Zealand is second only to the University of Auckland in the number of A rated academic researchers it...

 where he was Janitor until his retirement in 1893. He died in Dunedin survived by his son and daughter, his wife having died about nine years previously.

Purdie was the original describer of the New Zealand Little Bittern

New Zealand Little Bittern

The New Zealand Little Bittern is an extinct and enigmatic species of heron in the Ardeidae family. It was endemic to New Zealand and was last recorded alive in the 1890s....

(Ixobrychus novaezelandiae (Purdie, 1871)). He is also commemorated in the name of a plant, Helichrysum purdiei.