Field notes
Stories of conservation biology, visits to natural areas, science, and all sorts of wildlife encounters
Trip reports
Itineraries, travel tips, and checklists of species seen on adventures looking for birds home and abroad.
Gallery
A wide selection of pictures of birds, mammals, reptiles, and amphibian species by the site’s author.
about
‘Fui por el mundo buscando la vida:
pájaro a pájaro conocí la tierra’
‘I’ve wandered the world in search of life:
bird by bird I’ve come to know the earth‘
With these lines translated to English by Jack Schmitt, Chilean poet Pablo Neruda says goodbye to the birds.
I am Adrián Colino Barea, a young wildlife researcher from Alcoy (Spain), a Mediterranean town lying in a valley near Alicante surrounded by vultures and holm oak forests and flanked by two Natural Parks.
My passion for nature started early in my childhood, as I got in touch with the wildlife around home. This passion resulted in a career in Biology for which I moved abroad and faced the harsh winter of Finland and the rainy seasons in tropical rainforests.
My experience with nature has expanded greatly during these last years, as I visited countries in different ecoregions.
On a short trip to Morocco in 2018, I noticed how easy it was to contact with a bird still unknown to me — the house bunting (Escribano sahariano, ‘Saharan writer’ in my mother tongue Spanish). Sitting in the windows and feeding in squares of Marrakech, daily effortless encounters with this species in such non-bird related trip changed my perspective about birding while traveling, and inspired the creation of this site.
I am currently part of the Global Change and Conservation lab at the University of Helsinki (Finland). As a master’s student, I am using remote-sensing approaches to survey the distribution of bamboo across a Madagascar rainforest home to critically endangered bamboo lemurs.
In this context, Neruda’s words resonate in my mind as I get to know new people, cultures, places, and ideas by looking for birds across different countries.
As my experiences often build up on tips from other nature enthusiasts, I here share my own adventures in the field, in hopes this site serves as a small contribution to help connect nature and people.
FIELD NOTEBOOK
Fresh from the field!
A space to share stories of conservation biology, visits and reviews from natural areas, experiences during field work and research, and all sorts of wildlife encounters.
Sunsets in l’Albufera
Two days birding l’Albufera finished with terrific sunsets. Highlights included a mega greater yellowlegs, wintering jack snipes, a common scoter, the local sacred ibis, and numerous waders and waterfowl.
Firecrest business
Firecrests are working hard to defend their territories during my morning walk in El Romeral urban park in Alcoy today. A female hawfinch returns to this wintering hub for[…]
Trekking the tuit-tuit volcano
A trip to visit friends in Réunion Island years ago included a hike to Roche-Écrite as the birdwatching highlight. While looking for the extremely rare Réunion cuckooshrike, I encounter[…]
GLOBAL BIRDWATCHING
Trip reports
Chronicles and adventures looking for birds on different trips, both nature and work-oriented. Content on itineraries, checklists of species contacted, pictures, travel tips, and much more.
Lapland 2024
Five Spanish birders and nature enthusiasts traveled in a van beyond the Arctic Circle through the Finnish and Norwegian Lapland to connect with the wildlife of the tundra and taiga, camping under the midnight sun and surrounded by reindeer herds.
Kenya 2024 Human-Wildlife Conflict
Memorable wildlife encounters happened during a 2-week University of Helsinki course to interview peoples of different tribes on their interactions, experiences, and perspectives with big mammals and birds in central Kenya, with a final extension to coastal Watamu area.
Qatar 2024
Two biologists discovered the birds of Qatar during two long stopovers in this Middle Eastern country: one day allocated to drive through different habitats looking for Persian gulf targets, and one day birding in urban Doha by public transport.
Mauritius 2023
A cancelled flight on the way to a research trip to Madagascar resulted in unexpectedly exploring the jewel of the Indian Ocean for some days. The last individuals of extremely endangered endemic species struggle to persist, and I manage to find some using public transport.
