He was born in Leicester on 6 May 1917, the son of Leonard Roger Weatherley and his wife, Ethel Maude Collin.
[2] He won a scholarship to Oxford University studying Botany under A. G. Tansley and graduated MA in 1939.
He then won a further scholarship from the Colonial Office to study tropical agriculture, gaining a doctorate in 1942 and then being posted to Africa as Government Botanist to the Department of Agriculture in Uganda.
His journey to Uganda was extremely eventful as his ship was sunk by a German U-boat off the coast of Africa and he spent 18 hours in a lifeboat before being rescued.
Whilst there he became a member of the Cairngorm Club and was an elder at St Machar's Cathedral.