Eustace Barnes

Eustace Barnes (* 1963 in Faversham , Kent , England ) is a British bird illustrator and director of bird watching tours . He is married and has a son.

Life

Barnes grew up in a family of artists in Faversham. At an early age he developed a passion for bird watching and painting. As a teenager, he watched birds in the swamps of northern Kent, France, Spain and Turkey. He toured Europe in the early 1980s before studying geography and biology. After graduating from the University of Leeds , Barnes moved to Peru, where he worked for the Explorer's Inn, a country house in the Tambopata Nature Reserve in Madre de Dios , as a naturalist and tour guide in the Amazon rainforest . In South America, Barnes developed an interest in the ant bird family and bird song recording . He spent several years in the field visiting remote and under-explored regions across South America. In Cusco , Barnes met the bird watcher Barry Walker, with whom he organized bird watching tours in Peru and Bolivia. He also traveled to Asia, Australasia and Africa. Especially in the Himalayas, especially in Bhutan, and in the Chinese province of Sichuan , he organized some tours.

Barnes illustrated several books, including Pigeons and Doves: A Guide to Pigeons and Doves of the World by David Gibbs (2001), Field Guide to the Birds of Peru by James F. Clements, Naom Shany and Dana Gardner (2001), The Bowerbirds : Ptilonorhynchidae (Bird Families of the World) by Clifford Brodie Frith and Dawn Whyatt Frith (2004) and Cotingas and Manakins by Guy M. Kirwan and Graeme Green (2011).

Filmography

• 1999: Wild and Dangerous: Birdman of the Amazon (BBC documentary with Eustace Barnes)

Web links

• Profile at BirdQuest
• Profile at the Kent Ornithological Society