He had a life-long interest in entomology, and because of his education in agriculture (1950: "ingenieur agronome, Paris") and tropical agriculture (1954: "ingenieur ESAAT") he devoted a lot of his time to applied entomology in the tropics. His first research was in west Africa (Ivory coast, 1954-1955) and the Cameroons (1955-1956) on Coccidae and Scolytidae, respectively. Important for his knowledge of Braconidae was his stay in Madagascar (1958-1963), despite the fact that he was working on Delphacidae. He moved to Greece (1970-1975) to work on Tephritidae (Dacus oleae Gmelin). After a short stay in Jordan he started his work in the Entomological Laboratory of the Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris (1976-1979). He started to work on tropical Curculionidae, but soon he started with the taxonomy of Braconidae. His wide interest was typical for him, including technical questions such as the names of wing veins. His clear reasoning convinced me to change from the old but impractical system of wing nomenclature to the universal system which is being used more and more in Hymenoptera. He planned to work on Phanerotomini and described some new species, but one of his duties was to identify Braconidae, especially Microgasatrinae. After his stay in Senegal he changed his interests to Braconinae and Rutelinae, and soon devoted most of his time to the use of computers in taxonomy and phylogeny. The finished manuscipt (with the paleontologist D. Goujet) on a new phylogenetic method for comparing apomorphies (especially for the constructions of phylogenetic trees) will be published soon.
Bernard Sigwalt will be remembered as an enthusiastic colleague and as a good friend who had a strong feeling for injustice. His death is a severe loss for his family, for the Paris Museum, and for the scientific community in general.
Publications on Braconidae by B. Sigwalt