all wildlife holidays from the Travelling Naturalist are ATOL Protected by the Civil Aviation Authority AITO has placed us amongst the top ten member tour operators in the UK, according to their customer satisfaction survey last year

RSPB Butterfly Conservation

Wildlife Trusts World Land Trust

The Travelling Naturalist
our team of leaders

Our leaders are fine all-round naturalists with a wealth of field and leadership experience. It is their expertise and professionalism, coupled with an easy-going and flexible approach, that is probably the most important factor in the success of our tours. We also, where possible, link up with local experts to ensure really top-quality local information.

Neil Arnold Neil has now entered his fifth decade of leading, and is enjoying his semi-retirement. He will still be leading a few trips this year, continuing his enthusiasm for birds and mammals, especially cetaceans. He will also be available to share his wisdom with young Jamie...
Tony Beck Tony is a Canadian naturalist and professional photographer with a deep enthusiasm for his country's wildlife and wild places, especially the remote Canadian Arctic. He is a superbly skilled birdwatcher, with an easy-going and friendly approach to leading groups. He joins us once again to lead our Grand Manan tour.
Chris Charlesworth Chris began birding at the age of ten, with a passion for birds that has remained with him and ultimately inspired him to guide birding tours. He lives at Kelowna in British Columbia (where we spend two nights on our Canadian Rockies tour) and has travelled widely across his native North America. His knowledge of North America's birds and their calls is excellent - and with a little coaxing, he may be persuaded to demonstrate his repertoire of ‘owl imitations' on tour, said to be quite entertaining!
Liz Charter Liz joined us as a client on our 2005 Crete tour, when we were so impressed with her botanical expertise and enthusiasm that we immediately asked her back to co-lead ! She is a good all-round naturalist and a keen gardener, and is a fan of island life, having lived with her family for ten years on Orkney and ten years on the Isle of Man, where she currently works as a professional conservationist. This year she will again lead our tour to Crete.
Robin Chittenden Robin lives in Norfolk, and has a wide-ranging repertoire of overseas tours and excellent all-round wildlife experience. Well known as one of the UK's top wildlife photographers and is a photographic consultant for British Birds. He is one of the wildlife photographers for Natural England. When not busy tour leading, Robin runs Birdline East Anglia, an information service for birdwatchers. He has written a book on birds of prey, and took nearly all the photos in Stephen Moss's ‘Blokes & Birds'. He also fits in some freelance bird surveyor work and has even stepped in occasionally to help out at the Pinkfoot Gallery in Cley.
Graham Clark Graham lives in Edinburgh. He has been a keen birder since the age of nine, when he found a Hoopoe while convalescing from the mumps with his granny in Brighton. Since then he has pursued his interest across five continents - but only finding Hoopoes on three of them! Graham's varied career has ranged from oil-rig engineer to private secretary to the Minister of State for Scotland, and he's a past chairman of the Scottish Ornithologists' Club in Lothian. Seabirds, cetaceans, boat trips and islands are among his favourite things in life.
Tony Clarke Originally from London, and bitten by the travel bug at an early age, he has spent long periods birding overseas, notably in Australia, before finally putting down roots in the Canary Islands. Long established as the Canaries' top resident bird and wildlife guide, and author of the recently published Field Guide to the birds of the Atlantic Islands, no one is better qualified to lead our annual trips there.
Stephanie Coghlan Stephanie is an excellent all-round naturalist and a highly experienced tour leader. She has run her own wildlife tour company for 21 years, the well-known ‘Snail's Pace', and has led tours worldwide. She is author of the much-acclaimed ‘A Birdwatching Guide to Crete', and ‘A Birdwatching Guide to Brittany'. This year she once again leads our tours to The Peloponnese, Crete and Western Greece.
Callan Cohen South Africa-born Callan has more than 20 years experience of African birding. He lives in Cape Town where he runs Birding Africa, a company that specialises in birding trips in and around the Cape, and has spent more than ten years leading tours across the continent. With his comfortable easy style, he was an immediate hit with our groups and now designs and leads many of our tours throughout Africa. His all-round ability in the field and excellent people skills have earned him a deserved reputation as one of Africa's foremost birdwatching and wildlife tour guides.
Barrie Cooper Barrie has had a lifelong interest in nature. Birds such as skylarks, lapwings and yellow wagtails enthralled him as a young boy growing up in Lancashire. But a picture of a Cock-of-the-Rock triggered his love affair with foreign birds. He has since visited many countries in search of birds. He works as the RSPB's International Education Manager and this gives him the chance to combine his passions of wildlife, nature conservation and travel. Barrie led our eclipse trip to Turkey in 2006. This year he again joins us for an eclipse tour, to Sichuan in July.
David Cottridge David is a Cornishman by birth but chose to build his nest in London. In 1983, he won the British Birds ‘Bird Photograph of the Year' Award and is widely regarded as Britain's leading bird photographer. He's also one of the most popular lecturers on the UK birding circuit, renowned for his humorous delivery - and a vast repertoire of appalling jokes! Music, fuchsias, Riojas and making top-drawer curries are among his other passions - but please don't ask him about the triple jump!
Stephen Daly A birdwatcher since the age of eight, Stephen says his first birding memories are of Aberlady Bay on Scotland's Firth of Forth. Having subsequently lived and worked in the UK, Germany and France, he has finally settled near Barbate, in southernmost Spain, where he runs his own specialist wildlife tour company, Andalucian Guides. Stephen's hobbies include walking, painting, music, reading - and single malt whiskies. In 2008, we'll again be putting his linguistic skills and wide-ranging local knowledge to good use on a range of tours from his 'home patch' in Spain through to Austria and the Bavarian Alps.
Tim Earl Tim is based in Guernsey where he still does a little journalism, although most of his working time is now taken up by tour leading and prospecting for us. This year he is leading new 'trailblazer tours' for us to Peru, and Guatemala. His travels have taken him to several African countries, Australasia, Scandinavia and Russia, North America and the Neotropics and many places in mainland Europe. Tim's outgoing and informative style, enthusiasm, experience and humour are always greatly appreciated by our clients.
Bob Ford A fine all-round naturalist, Bob was Assistant Warden of Portland Bird Observatory for a time and now lectures in Biology. His calm, relaxed leadership style has found much favour both with beginners and more experienced birdwatchers, and he again leads our New Forest break in July and Dorset break in May. Bob is also a keen computer man, and looks after our much-acclaimed website, as well as running a web-based photographic agency of his own.
Neil Gartshore has been birdwatching since an early age and worked for nature conservation organisations for nearly 25 years in the UK and South Africa. He now runs Calluna Books (specialising in out of print natural history books) and works as a freelance ornithologist and a natural history guide in Dorset and further afield. He has travelled and birdwatched extensively, mainly in Europe, South Africa and, since 1994 when he married his Japanese wife, has travelled to many different parts of Japan.
Keith Grant Keith has lived with his family in Devon for over twenty years and used to edit the Devon Bird Report. He is a keen bird ringer, formerly at Farlington Marshes in Hampshire, and now in South Devon. Apart from passage migrants and a Pied Flycatcher nestbox scheme, his particular interests are in monitoring Barn Owls with the Barn Owl Trust and rehabilitated Guillemots with the South Devon Seabird Trust. He is one of our principal leaders, and his cheerful good humour and keen eye and ear have earned him an enthusiastic following.
Daniel Green Daniel is a friendly and outgoing local Swedish birder, who has designed and leads our Swedish itinerary for us. A birdwatcher since early childhood, he is still mad about Cranes (his favourite bird), owls, butterflies & moths, and feeding birds in wintertime. He has also spent 12 years as a gourmet chef, has been a newspaper journalist/photographer and more recently editor of a Swedish Bird Magazine.
Paul Harvey Paul moved to Shetland from Dorset in 1984 and has lived there ever since. He was Warden at Fair Isle Bird Observatory from 1989 to 1992 before moving to the South Mainland of Shetland where he worked for Scottish Natural Heritage, managing their superb set of National Nature Reserves. He now manages the Shetland Biological Records Centre. His knowledge of Shetland and its wildlife makes him the perfect leader for our regular trip there in June. He will also be returning to lead on our Spitsbergen cruise.
Andy Jones Now resident in Iceland, Andy was a warden on Skomer Island, a ranger with the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park, the RSPB's senior investigations officer and a Wildlife Trust director. He trained as a geologist and is an enthusiastic bird- and whale-watcher who has also been known to admire an occasional plant! He guides our tours to Iceland, where his knowledge of geology can really shine, as well as our tours to Norway for Orcas and the Azores.
Peter Kennerley Peter lives in Suffolk but had previously spent ten years living in Hong Kong, followed by four in Singapore. His first love is Asian birds and his many trips have included tours to China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Malaysia, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. Peter's expertise extends much more widely than this, however, to include many European and African destinations too. When not away tour leading, Peter is actively involved with British Birds magazine, and is busy penning a guide to some of the world's trickiest warblers.
Mike Langman Mike is a superb wildlife illustrator, and you will be familiar with his work that enlivens the pages of our brochure, as well as his magnificent cover illustrations – we think he has excelled himself again this year! Despite his busy schedule we occasionally tempt him to put his excellent leadership skills to good use for us, again this year on our tour to Southern Turkey in May.
Mike Lockwood Mike lives near Girona, where he works as a free-lance author and naturalist, and leads tours regularly throughout Catalonia and Spain. An all-round field naturalist, he monitors butterfly, dragonfly, bird and plant populations for various Catalan environmental organisations, but above all considers himself an entomologist. He will be leading for us again in Menorca, the French Cévennes and Val D'Aran in the Pyrenees, as well as a new tour that he has developed to the Ebro Delta.
John Muddeman John is a freelance wildlife tour guide, author, translator and founder-member of the Spanish Association of Birdwatching Guides. Living in Madrid he is currently co-authoring ‘The Birds of the Balearic Isles', and researching for ‘A Birdwatching Guide to Central Spain' and the second edition of his first book, ‘A Birdwatching Guide to Extremadura', which will be familiar to many who have already discovered the delights of this lovely part of Spain. Judging by all the good things you have to say about him, his all-round natural history knowledge, affable personality and extremely sharp field skills have brought him a well-deserved loyal following.
Rebecca Nason Rebecca is a keen birder, freelance ecologist and professional bird photographer who currently lives in Suffolk, but we first met her on Fair Isle, where she spent two seasons as Assistant Warden and Seabird Monitoring Officer. She has led our tours to Lesvos since 2005, with her partner, Philip Harris, seen together in the pic on our Spitsbergen trip last year. Phil is a firefighter, and an avid birder, with a passion for all aspects of natural history, spending much of his spare time out in the field ringing and carrying out bird surveys.
Robin Noble Having known the Highlands and Islands all his life, Robin is deeply interested in all aspects from the rocks upwards. Having run a Field Centre in Orkney, his enthusiasm for archaeology and wildlife led on to teaching and writing about environmental history at a variety of levels, (including his introductory book “North and West”)... He once again leads our much-enjoyed Wildlife and History Tour in Orkney, as well as returning to the Small Isles of Eigg and Rum, and the Scottish Highlands programme, based at Aigas Field Centre, with which he has a long association. The Sutherland trip explores the great open spaces of his home county.
Ray Nowicki Ray moved to live and work in wildlife tourism in the Highlands of Scotland over six years ago following a period with the R.S.P.B, and now works as a freelance guide. His main interest lies in the wildlife of Scotland but we have tempted him away to lead some of our overseas tours, where we have been impressed with his enthusiasm, leadership skills and abilities as an all-round naturalist. This year he has designed a new tour for us to the Scottish Highlands in summer.
Gabor Orban Gabor Orban is a professional all-around naturalist guide leading birding, butterfly, mammal and botanical tours both in Central Europe and Americas. He spends half the year on each continent, migrating each year, he says ‘like a bird' – but he hasn't told us what species he is like! He is one of the brains behind Ecotours Hungary and will be leading our Romania flower tour.
Mike Raymakers Mike has led tours and worked as a nature guide in Southern Africa & Namibia for the last 15 years. His knowledge of botany, ornithology, geology and anthropology, is excellent, particularly with regard to the complex ecological roles that the plants, birds, insects and mammals play in the sub continent. A keen conservationist and natural history photographer, he is an accredited Field Guide Association of Southern Africa guide, as well as being accredited and registered with the South African Tour Guide Association.
Liz Read Liz has the patience of a saint – she must have to put up with Mike's constant barrage of jokes! Her interest in natural history has grown since they have been together and she has acquired good skills at identifying Western European plants. Liz's caring and thoughtful manner, and leading with husband Mike, provide the perfect combination of skills for an all-round holiday to destinations such as Southern Portugal, Corsica and the Camargue.
Mike Read Mike is a man of many talents: an experienced tour leader, an author, and, as he is probably best known, a superb wildlife photographer. He has a number of books to his name including ‘The Barn Owl', ‘Red Kite Country' and ‘The New Forest National Park'. Mike's friendly and easy-going style of leadership and his abilities as an all round naturalist add immensely to the tours he leads in Europe and the USA. All he needs are some new jokes for the returning clients he often gets! Mike's own website is www.mikeread.co.uk.
Phil Read Phil is a meteorologist whose work has taken him to some far-flung places, including Antarctica. He is also a great fan of those far-flung British Isles, the Isles of Scilly, which he has been visiting for many years, and will be returning to co-lead our regular spring and autumn visits there.
Brian Small Brian lives in Suffolk. A teacher for 11 years, his true love has always been bird art and he now works full time on his illustrative work. Brian's current projects include work on major new guides to birds in various parts of Africa. In between times, he likes to sift through gull flocks on the local pig fields - something of a solitary occupation we're told!
Greg Smith Greg Smith is in his final year of a 27-year career with the California State Park System. Formerly a park ecologist, Greg is now a superintendent of eight park units, focusing on education on the importance of preserving natural and cultural resources. Greg has birded on all seven continents and has led natural history and birding tours in California, Alaska, Argentina, Chile, the Falkland Islands, South Georgia, and Antarctica. An avid wildlife photographer, he also maintains a U.S. Master Bird Banding permit.
Attila Steiner Attila has been a keen naturalist and birdwatcher since childhood. Before joining Ecotours Hungary he worked for WWF Hungary on species conservation. He has travelled extensively through most of Europe, Asia and Africa and led several birdwatching tours to Ethiopia and Ghana.
Peter Taylor Peter is 'our man in Australia'. Originally from Stockport, Peter spent his teenage years at Adelaide in South Australia and has since birded extensively across this great continent. For the last ten years, has lived in the tall timber country of Manjimup, to the south of Perth in Western Australia - a hotspot for endemic birds and plants. Having forsaken a comfortable career with the government to follow his true passion for birds and birdwatching, Peter now works full-time as a bird and wildlife tour guide.
Arnoud van den Berg Arnoud lives in the Netherlands, where he is editor and founder of Dutch Birding magazine. He's also a top-notch bird photographer, sound recordist and a prolific author, too! Backing up his many talents in the field and enviable linguistic skills, he somehow manages to carry a cavernous rucksack full of state-of-the-art birding gadgetry, the mysterious contents of which help to ensure a great time (or a hernia!) is had by all.
Will Wagstaff Will is Hon. President of the Isles of Scilly Bird Group and is well known to most visitors to the isles both for his lectures and the regular wildlife excursions that he leads throughout the spring and summer. We are delighted that he will once again be co-leading our groups there.