Leslie Charles Coleman (16 June 1878 – 14 September 1954) was a Canadian entomologist, plant pathologist and virologist who worked as the first director of agriculture in Mysore State in southern India. He conducted pioneering research on the pests and diseases affecting agriculture in the region and was instrumental in establishing several agricultural research and educational institutions including the Hebbal Agricultural School which later became a part of the University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore and the Coffee Research Station at Balehonnur which became the Central Coffee Research Institute. He introduced improved tillage implements, sprayers, tractors, and played a key role in the establishment of the Mysore Sugar Company in Mandya. His major contributions to plant protection included measures to control a rot disease of coffee caused by Pellicularia koleroga (now Ceratobasidium noxium) known in southern India as koleroga. Coleman established measures for koleroga, a generic name for rot-causing diseases in Kannada, that caused complete destruction in areca plantations. Sprays of inexpensive Bordeaux mixture on the growing crowns helped control infection caused by what he described as Phytophthora arecae (now considered as Phytophthora palmivora).
Early life
Leslie Coleman was born in Durham County, Ontario, Canada, on 16 June 1878 to Elizabeth Ann née Beer and Francis T. Coleman. He had three brothers and two sisters. The family appears to have moved between Toronto and Spokane, Washington, as Coleman went to the Arthur High School and Harbord Collegiate Institute after which Leslie became a primary school teacher (following his brother Norman Frank Coleman who became a President of Reed CollegePresidents of Reed while another brother Herbert was principal of Spokane High School). In 1900 he joined the University of Toronto and graduated in science with a Governor General's Gold medal in 1904. Coleman spent the summer of 1904 at the marine research stations at Malpeque and at Georgian Bay where he studied oyster cultivation. He also trained at the Bureau of Entomology in 1905. He received the Frederick Wyld Prize for English Essay in 1905. He moved to Germany for further study and obtained a doctorate from the University of Göttingen. Here he studied nitrification by soil bacteria.Coleman, L.C. (1908). Investigation in Nitrification. Bacteriological Institute, University of Gottingen, Centr. Bakt. Parasitink, 2nd abt. 20:401–420, 485–513. He trained in mycology under Heinrich Klebahn. From 1906, he worked at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Agriculture and Forestry in Berlin for two years before he obtained a five-year appointment as Mycologist and Entomologist in the State of Mysore in India in 1908.
India
Coleman joined as an entomologist in the agricultural research establishment begun in the State of Mysore by Adolf Lehmann, a Canadian chemist of German descent. Lehmann's appointment as a chemist had followed from the recommendations of the committee headed by Dr J.A. Voelcker to improve agriculture in India and while Lehmann's focus had been on soil fertility but he felt the need for a qualified plant protection expert. Shortly after Coleman's arrival the government of Mysore decided not to renew Lehmann's contract and following the death of his wife, wished to return to Canada. From 1908, Coleman then had to take over management of the chemistry department of the Mysore Agricultural Department while also studying crop pests and diseases. Early studies included the ring disease of potato. The chemist H. V. Krishnayya who had served from Lehmann's time continued to serve as chemist for both the geology and agriculture departments. In 1912, he wrote on agronomic experiments conducted on traditional paddy varieties and their cultivation techniques at the Hebbal research farms. At the 1912 Dasara exhibition in Mysore, Coleman organized an exhibit of insect pests and measures for their management which proved to be immensely popular.
Director of agriculture
Coleman's five year contract was due to expire on January 7, 1913 and it was reviewed and the government passed a resolution to appoint him in permanent service as Director of Agriculture with a pay of Rs 1200 with annual increments of Rs 50 rising to Rs 1400. An earlier allowance of Rs 75 sanctioned for additionally being in charge of the Agricultural Chemistry Department was abolished. Coleman held the position of director until 1934 with breaks between 1925 and 1928.
Agricultural education, research, and outreach One of his first tasks was the establishment of the Hebbal Agricultural School which began in July 1913. He served as its founding principal. This was followed by the establishment of three vernacular agricultural schools at Chikkanhalli, Hassan, and Ramakrishnapur established on land donated by farmers for the purpose. During Coleman's tenure research was conducted by the agriculture department but he foresaw the role of a university as the centre for research. The school at Hebbal later became the Agricultural College at Hebbal in Bangalore (on 14 June 1946Anon. (1972) Agricultural College, Hebbal. 1946-1972. Silver Jubilee Souvenir. University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore. pp. 1-2.) and in 1964 became a part of the University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore. Another innovation was the establishment of the Mysore Agricultural and Experimental Union in 1918, consisting of land owning cultivators interested in carrying out experiments and scientific investigations on new methods, conduct manure and crop trials just like the government experimental farms while also popularising new ideas among farmers. A field day was held once a year in November. The Union was based on a similar idea in Ontario and published a quarterly journal in English (Journal of the Mysore Agricultural Experimental Union now called the Mysore Journal of Agricultural Sciences) and a Kannada monthly.Coleman showed a keen interest in matters of policy and administration from an early period. In 1918, Coleman spoke at the Mysore Economic Conference on the Japanese approach to consolidation of small farmer holdings to reduce wastage of land for boundaries and noted that such an idea would be difficult to implement in India due to the Hindu laws of inheritance. He examined the kinds of changes in Indian agriculture that could be easily mediated and accepted by Indian farmers in the longer term. He pointed out that spreading good practices and efficient instruments from one region to another as an effective exercise and favoured the spread of selections of crop varieties to the use of hybrids.
World War I From January 1919 to July, Coleman taught biology to Canadian army personnel returning from the First World War in a makeshift training centre in Ripon, Yorkshire. This six month course at the Khaki University was accepted by Canadian universities as equal to a full year of coursework. Coleman reflected on his experience in education in this setup in a Mysore University publication noting how the lack of a proper building hardly affected the aim of providing education.
Sericulture and the Civil Veterinary Department In 1920 Coleman was given the added responsibility of administration of the department of sericulture (but moved back under the director of industries and commerce in 1923), the Civil Veterinary and Amrut Mahal Departments was also placed under the care of his department. In order to assist him, Coleman recruited fellow-Canadian Wilfred Davison as livestock expert in 1920. Davison however resigned in 1925. Coleman oversaw the establishment of the Mysore Serum Institute to produce rinderpest vaccine was established at Hebbal between 1927 and 1930. He helped organized better silk reeling techniques and oversaw the establishment of the Mysore Silk Filature. A cattle breeding farm was established at Parvatrayanakere, Ajjampura in 1929.
Coffee research station The Coffee Research Station at Balehonnur was established in 1925 with an original eighteen acres of coffee land and 18 acres of forest leased out by C.S. Crawford. The government added 14 acres of gomal (cattle grazing commons), and 165 acres of forest to it. Still later the government purchase Crawford's land and additional 65 acres to make up a total of 280 acres. Research was conducted here on coffee varieties, studies on pests and diseases. In the 1930s Coleman's personal research related to coffee included studies on the coffee rust, Hemileia vastatrix.Coleman, L.C. (1932) Report of work on the Coffee Experiment Station, Balehonnur, for the years 1930 and 1931. Mysore, Coffee Experiment Station. Bulletin No. 8.
Areca and Koleroga
Coleman's major work with the areca farmers was in the management of a major fungal disease of areca caused by multiple species of Phytophthora including Phytophthora palmivora (then called P. arecae). The outbreak of rot began following the rains and the traditional attempts to control them involved climbing the tree and tying what were locally called kotte, a rain protection for the nuts made from the bases of the fronds of the palm. This was a labour intensive process and still resulted in rotten nuts. Additionally the crown of the tree would get infected followed by death of the palm. Coleman experimented with and identified the well-known Bordeaux mixture as an inexpensive solution to control the spread of oospores during the monsoon. Farmers however needed to be trained on how to produce the mixture with careful pH measurement, and to apply it on the growing crown and base of the nuts just prior to the onset of the monsoon. Spray at a height however was a challenge and required new equipment, and Coleman went about organizing import subsidies on sprayers through the agriculture department.
Research administration
As a research administrator Coleman recruited and mentored the Indian entomologist K. Kunhikannan, the mycologist M. J. Narasimhan and several others who worked as assistants. Several of his research team were subsequently sent for training and higher education abroad. Coleman continued to take an interest in pathology and entomology research in spite his growing administrative duties. Around 1914, he studied a mycoplasma-like infection that affected sandal and caused sandal spike. Sandalwood spike was said to have spread around Hassan and Bangalore and 2418.5 tons of sandalwood were sold in that year as opposed to 2363 tons the previous year (and earning Rs 22,68,608) but the price per ton had doubled leading to serious economic concerns. In 1930 Coleman spent some time visiting Java. During this visit he examined the coffee berry borer (Hypothenemus hampei) which was suspected to have entered India. On his return he also suggested experiments on X-ray induced mutation for breeding new sugarcane varieties based on observations of similar attempts on tobacco at the Klaten Experimental Station in Java. These mutation experiments were then conducted by the geneticist and plant breeder Venkatrao K. Badami.