Peru is home to an impressive number of birds—almost 2,000—and many of them live right in the Amazon. Even if you have already been birding in a tropical country, there are still several endemic birds that can only be found in Peru and nowhere else on the planet. The key to Peru’s bird diversity can be explained by its distinctive geography—it’s where the Andes mountains meet the lowland Amazon, and [...]
Rich Hoyer's first guiding and teaching experience came when he was a senior in high school when he was asked to teach a birdwatching class to a group of 3rd and 4th graders. Since then he has been a guide with WINGS Birding Tours for over 20 years. Check out what he had to say about his recent trips to Peru. What brings you birding to southeast Peru, and to [...]
Any passionate birdwatcher or avian researcher knows that a forest with a diverse array of habitats is a likely treasure trove of brilliant, rare and charismatic avifauna. The Los Amigos Biological Station and reserve managed by Amazon Conservation in southeast Peru is just such a place. Situated in two floodplains, with terra firme, bamboo and palm swamp habitats, Los Amigos is home to almost 600 bird species, almost a third [...]
Recently, we hosted a distinguished American ornithologist at two of our birding lodges in southeastern Peru. Dr. Robert Ridgely, whose name is synonymous with South American ornithology, was impressed by the “extraordinary habitat” surrounding the lodges, calling the deeply forested transect from Wayqecha Birding Lodge, high in the Andes, down to Manu Birding Lodge is one of the “the biggest, wildest montane forests” on the planet. Dr. Ridgely is a distinguished author, ornithologist [...]
There are many incredible birding festivals taking place in the US every year, and we love meeting new faces every time we attend one! This year, in addition to the Space Coast Birding Festival that we attended in early January, we’ll be sharing the experience of birding with us in the Peruvian Amazon at two upcoming events. If you’ll be in town, make sure to attend and say hello! American Birding Expo – [...]
In the 2015 Global Big Day, Los Amigos Birding Lodge registered the fifth highest number of bird species in the world (308) – and with good reason. Not only do we have sharp-eyed bird guides stationed there, but Los Amigos is adjacent to the Los Amigos Conservation Concession and just east of world-famous Manu National Park, which means it is surrounded by millions of acres of protected wilderness. The landscape is a mosaic of [...]
As a reader of our newsletter, we assume you care about the Amazon region, the conservation work we do there, and/or have already visited our lodges. If so, we could really use your help! Amazon Conservation has been working hard to increase the recognition of our birding lodges down in the Peruvian Amazon, as the marriage between tourism and our conservation research is closely linked. The more successful we are [...]
University of British Columbia PhD candidate Micah Scholer has visited Peru enough times to know the lay of the land and discover some of the incredible birds the country has to offer. Read about how he got into birding, the research project he is conducting in the Amazon, and some of his adventures in the field. How did you become interested in birds? Growing up in northern Minnesota I spent lots of time [...]
I discovered my passion for birds years ago while researching macaws in the Peruvian rainforest in Tambopata, one of the most biodiverse spots on the planet with a wide variety of habitats and around 550 bird species. Among the variety of habitats found there, the most amazing to me was the bamboo forest, one of the largest bamboo patches of the entire Tambopata area, and also a favorite of the [...]
Birds and wildlife, that’s what I was hoping to see on my journey to the tropical rainforest in southeastern Peru with conservationists from Amazon Conservation. Our destination was Amazon Conservation’s Los Amigos lodge and research station, part of a pristine 350,000 acre conservation concession area bordering the iconic Manu National Park. Traveling to the lodge on a lovely four hour boat ride up the Madre de Dios river set the tone for [...]
