Birding Tour Peru: Central Peru

The Central Andes of Peru is one of the least known birding routes in South America, and this is completely unjustified.

Golden-backed Mountain Tanager is one of our special targets on this trip (photo Alejandro Tello).

Our magnificent tour is designed to take you across the central Andes of Peru, visiting different habitats and ecosystems at varying elevations providing diverse sets of unique avian species, including several country endemics not found anywhere else. We start the trip by visiting the coast of Lima, exploring the cold waters of the Humboldt Current and habitats on the western slopes of the Andes, such as freshwater lagoons, the dry Pacific desert, the unique Peruvian lomas (areas of fog-watered vegetation in the coastal desert), the dry inter-Andean valleys, and the high-elevation mountains at the base of the mighty, snow-capped Central Andes. We will also visit the endangered Polylepis forest, which holds several sought-after Andean species. We then descend the eastern slopes of the Andes, where we explore elfin forest, like páramos, lush cloudforest and upper Amazon forest.

Perhaps the prettiest tern in the world, Inca Tern.

This birding and overlanding trip will take three weeks in total, and we could see species such as Inca Tern, Humboldt Penguin, Peruvian Thick-knee, Peruvian Pipit, Thick-billed Miner, Andean Tinamou, Great Inca Finch, White-capped Dipper, Torrent Duck, Andean Condor, Least, Grey-breasted, and Rufous-bellied Seedsnipes, White-bellied Cinclodes, Diademed Sandpiper-Plover, Andean Flicker, Junin Grebe, Black Rail (the endemic subspecies, often referred to as ‘Junin Rail’), Andean Avocet, Puna Plover, Andean Cock-of-the-rock, Blue-banded Toucanet, Peruvian Wren, and Crimson-mantled Woodpecker. In addition, we might find Bay Antpitta, Masked Fruiteater, Chestnut-crested Cotinga, White-eared Solitaire, Cloudforest Screech Owl, Oilbird, Bay Antpitta, Stripe-headed Antpitta, Rufous Antpitta, Rufous-vented Tapaculo, White-cheeked Cotinga, Bay-vented Cotinga, Blue-headed Macaw, and many more.

We should get views of the most-wanted Diademed Sandpiper-plover.