Anthony Hume Whitaker MNZM (5 September 1944 – 20 February 2014) was a New Zealand herpetologist, contributing a 50-year career of fieldwork, pioneering research and species discoveries.

[4] He grew up in Upper Hutt, attending St. Patrick's College, Silverstream, and later gaining his Bachelor of Science degree majoring in zoology from Victoria University of Wellington in 1966.

Whitaker helped found the Society for Research on Amphibians and Reptiles in New Zealand in 1987 and was a long-serving editor of its journal, SRARNZ Notes.

He produced about 230 published papers and scientific and conservation reports, mentored many in the field, and was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the 2010 Queen's Birthday Honours, for services to herpetology.

[6] He remarked at the time that one of his greatest achievements had been to recognise early on the predatory threat that rats pose to native reptile species, confirmed by later research and pest eradication programmes.