10,000 Birds

JUNE 29, 2023

Yet, I was not aware of any of Arjan’s big year updates in English, so I had no clue where he was or how many species he managed to see. After 3 months of South and Southeast Asia, Indonesia and Australia, Arjan’s count stood at 2,060 species. And I wanted to learn about his travels in detail.

Papua New Guinea 240

Papua New Guinea Guinea Suriname South America 240

10,000 Birds

JULY 19, 2018

It divides countries into categories, where the next category has 200 more species. In some cases the data are outdated, e.g. Costa Rica has 900 and not 800 species, but I made no corrections, remaining faithful to the original map data. Shown as a list, it looks like this: Less than 200 bird species: Antarctica; oceanic islands.

Equatorial Guinea 188

Equatorial Guinea Costa Rica Guyana Central African Republic 188

10,000 Birds

JULY 22, 2014

Other species have certainly expanded their ranges, but never in such a rapid and global scale. The Cattle Egret is native to Africa, where it is a familiar sight among herds of large mammals. For reasons that are not quite clear, this species underwent a massive range expansion. This species is primarily an insectivore.

Cattle 170

Cattle South Korea Suriname Seychelles 170

10,000 Birds

JULY 17, 2012

Or the time in Suriname that we drove 3 hours to film Capuchinbirds only to learn that he left our video camera back at the lodge (next to an empty vodka bottle!). However, morphologically and behaviorally they are perhaps closer to the Kagu of New Caledonia and the Painted Snipes of Africa. But I digress. A real misfit basically.

Costa Rica 250

Costa Rica Suriname Eggs Hunting 250