Birds of the Tropical Andes, by Owen Deutsch and Michael J. Parr
Princeton University Press, 2025
264 pages, hardcover
ABA Sales–Buteo Books 15502
Birds of the Tropical Andes is hard to pigeonhole: It’s a silky-smooth, large-format, coffee-table-style serenade of light and color to the planet’s most avian-rich biome, replete with sprinklings of scientific insight, lessons on complex Andean biogeography, ideas for where to go see some of the species pictured, and even pithy behavioral and identification tips.
We should probably start where most readers will, with the photos. After all, open any page and you will be treated to some kind of “bird porn,” ahem. Having lived on the continent for two decades and dabbled in the-occasional bit of photography (blame being the sibling of a well-known bird photographer), I can attest to the difficulty of photographing some of these species, especially Deutsch’s pin-sharp, field-guide-style close ups. These could well grace many of the Macaulay Library’s top ten, and it is perhaps not coincidental that Deutsch had a long career as a fashion photographer; it shows in his compositions. But for me it’s the photos with a wider, more atmospheric aesthetic that are most enchanting; this is a love affair with the mountains, cloud forests, and bofedales (a type of high-altitude wetland found in the Andes) as much as with its feathered inhabitants.
Many of Deutsch’s images show ecosystems in flux, with cultures striving to protect imperiled and dwindling tracts of primary habitat. It is a book to display, to pore over, but, most importantly, to feel compelled to action by. The conservation message comes through loud and clear—not least by the philanthropic decision to donate 100 percent of the book’s royalties to the American Bird Conservancy. It is a clarion call to anyone who cares deeply about how we steward some of these remaining wild spaces in one of the most biodiverse regions on Earth.
Structurally, the book is less an ode to taxonomic ordering as it is to the myriad habitats, microclimates, and biome diversity that are so unique to the Andes. They are a young mountain range despite their height and length. It is a place where avian evolution can still be frequently witnessed among cryptic inter-Andean valleys and remote páramo (a high-altitude grassland). In this respect, it is a field guide to habitats as much as birds. Think of it as a virtual birding tour, but with much, much better views.
Each chapter begins with some history and biogeography for the habitat it treats, from the altiplano to xerophytic scrubby foothills, through to highly granular biomes like Tumbesia from northwestern Peru into Ecuador. Following this is an overview of key conservation pressures, followed by some of the specialist species harbored within, finishing with tips for linking national parks and ecolodges together, along with the best birding and photography sites. This layout has a beautiful logic to it as the birds are seen in the context of not just their niche or environment but also the other birds around them.
Such a carefully curated odyssey through Andean biogeography makes compelling reading too. Parr, like Deutsch, is not a newcomer to writing about birds. Take the page on Mitred Parakeets—a well-known confusing species in a family not generally known for being puzzling! Parr mentions the differences between similar taxa without getting into the weeds and points readers in the direction of a field guide to find out more. These touches make this book feel like “the book you buy before you buy the field guide”—when the dream of a future trip is just forming. Parr also links together related species and explains, as much as space allows, some of the effects of austral migration, speciation by altitude and latitude, and even examples of extralimital records.
Importantly, the book also gives a voice to many regional conservation leaders from Fundación ProAves to Asociación Armonía. It feels deeply rooted in a desire to protect our bejewelled flying dinosaurs of the Andes and is laid out and designed to inspire hope. One of these voices is Fundación Jocotoco. CEO Martin Schaefer is given a page to talk about his work in his own words. This is a nice touch, doubling down on the sense that this book is chasing optimism, through a healthy marriage between local communities, NGOs, and international charities. Avitourism has become big business in some of these countries, in particular Colombia and Ecuador.
At this year’s Global Birdfair, the Colombian government, along with many tour companies, filled almost an entire marquee. It was the kind of marquee that takes a week to put up, with flatscreen TVs and chocolate tasting stations. That birders from all corners of the world formed long queues to chat with local guides is testament to the whole region’s investment in the conservation of their birdlife and with their extant but increasingly threatened wilderness. With this publication, Parr and Deutsch have stoked that fire with plenty of fuel. It should occupy the bookshelf of any birder or bird photographer, regardless of their connection to the region. Because that connection will be indelibly formed upon reading the book.
Dominic García-Hall owned and operated a birding tour company in Argentina back in the day when there were very few. He sold it to go sit in an office all day in New York City but has since course corrected and now devotes most of his time to field recording, birding war zones, and forever editing a dawn chorus sound installation.
