Page 38 - BBC Wildlife Volume 36 #11

COLOMBIA BIRDING
battering my shirt, I spy a great kiskadee,
russet-throated puffbird, black-crested
antshrike and vermillion flycatcher. “Nobody
was birdwatching in La Guajira 10 years
ago – there were no guides; no facilities,” says strategy in 2015, but in the face of bumper
Luis Eduardo Urueña, biologist and owner of
Manakin Nature Tours, during a rare moment
of reprieve from his binoculars. “As tourists
come in, local communities are becoming
more interested in wildlife, and tour operators
are working closely with them. Kids now talk
about being guides when they grow up – it’s
seen as a cool job.”
At 35, Luis is one of the oldest guides
that I meet; most are in their twenties. He
grew up amidst the brutality of civil war and
drug-related violence that has long blighted
Colombia, recounting how he lost his father,
grandmother and countless friends. I offer
my sympathies and he shrugs it off as
normal. “Everybody lost people,” he
says. He recalls, when, studying
the blue-billed curassow in the
Magdalena Valley, he woke from a
nap in a coca plantation just in time to dodge
a dousing of glyphosate, a potent herbicide
38 BBC Wildlife
PLANNING TO VISIT?
kk UK-based tour operators include:
WildlifeTravel (wildlife-travel.co.uk);
NatureTrek (naturetrek.co.uk)
and ResponsibleTravel
(responsibletravel.com)
kk Colombia-based tour operators
include: Manakin NatureTours
(manakinnaturetours.com);
Quetzal Birdwatch (birdingsanta
marta.com); Colombia Birdwatch
(colombiabirdwatch.com); Nature
Colombia (naturecolombia.
com) andThe Colombian Project
(colombianproject.com)
kk Find out more about the trail at
northerncolombiabirdingtrail.com
of desert, where tired looking grasses sprout
from the dust in withered stands of grey.
Above: the endemic Of the legions of birds of prey that patrol
white-tailed the skies here, there’s one in particular that
starfrontlet is one we seek: the burrowing owl. It’s almost too
of 164 hummingbird easy – within seconds, a pair of enormous
species found in
Colombia. Left: the orange eyes are glaring at us through the
El Dorado Lodge tussocks. Roadside and savannah hawks
was the first in circle overhead, an aplomado falcon alights
Colombia to cater for on a treetop and a merlin performs an
international birders.
Below: blue-naped impressive fly-by. “I wouldn’t want to be a
chlorophonia in lizard in this desert,” remarks Angel, and
the Santa Marta I have to agree: in less than an hour, we’ve
Mountains.
clocked seven different species. As we make
our way back to the jeep, the owl reappears
on a low bank, bobbing up and down on
spindly legs as if offering a farewell courtesy.
pelted down by crop-dusters as part of a
US-led coca-eradication programme launched Flying into the future
in 2000. Associated health risks spurred The Northern Colombia Birding Trail has
the Colombian government to suspend the triggered a huge surge of interest in avian
eco-tourism as a tool for conservation and
harvests (according to the UN, the amount of economic development; new trails in the
land under coca cultivation increased by 17 per Andes are now under development.
cent in 2017), it has, controversially, approved Nevertheless, caution is required as Colombia
fumigation by drone. navigates this moment of post-war crossroads.
There’s little evidence of troubles past as “The government needs to seriously fund
Luis and Angel lead our group on three visits conservation and ensure that eco-tourism
to Los Flamencos Flora and Fauna Sanctuary, revenue supports protected area
a coastal reserve created to protect the management, habitat protection and rural
American (or Caribbean) flamingo – and 185 livelihoods, and aerial fumigation is a real
other species to boot. We meander through concern,” says Myers. “But the trail is a game-
a scrubby forest, float on shallow lagoons in changer for this country. Of the gazillions of
canoes and go raptor-spotting in an open area conservation projects that I’ve worked on, Hummingbird: Alamy; lodge: Gabbro/Alamy; chlorophonia: Thomas Marent/Minden/FLPA
none have been like it – it has changed lives
and surpassed anything I could have
imagined. I hope Colombia can share its
beauty with the world for years to come.”
SARAH MCPHERSON is section
editor of BBC Wildlife Magazine.
She travelled to Colombia courtesy
of ProColombia and WhereNext.
November 2018