David J. Harberd was a genecologist who worked at the Scottish Plant Breeding Station in Pentlandfield, Scotland, from 1952 to 1962, where he worked under James W. Gregor (the Station's director) and Patricia J. Watson (head of the herbage plant and genecology section). His work focused on Festuca, as well as statistical and methodological issues in genecology. He attended the first meeting of what would become the Ecological Genetics Group, which is now a Special Interest Group of the British Ecological Society.