John F. Kvarnbäck, 33 years old biologist, originally from Sweden but now living in Caracas, Venezuela since a few years back. A keen birdwatcher and ringer since childhood in Sweden and now he has really taken the Venezuelan birds to his heart.

He has a particularly good knowledge of the fauna in the Andes, the central coastal mountain range, Bolivar state, and of the Venezuelan plains ("Los Llanos", where he did his Master's thesis in 2002 about the semi-endemic Yellow-knobbed Curassow (Crax daubentoni)).

He speaks Swedish, English and Spanish.

I am a freelance ornithological editor and tour-leader, based part in the UK and part in Brazil. I was one of the original founders of the Neotropical Bird Club (http://www.neotropicalbirdclub.org/) and have served as the Managing Editor of its journal, Cotinga, since 1997, as well as on the editorial board of its recently launched birding magazine, Neotropical Birding. Since 2004, I have also been the incumbent editor of the Bulletin of the British Ornithologists' Club (http://www.boc-online.org/), one of the world's premier ornithological journals specialising in taxonomy, nomenclature and distribution. Together with Ron Demey, I am also involved in editing the Bulletin of the African Bird Club (check their website, http://www.africanbirdclub.org/, for information about the journal and birds throughout the African continent). Between 1996 and the end of 2004 I was the editor of Sandgrouse, the journal of the Ornithological Society of the Middle East (http://www.osme.org/). I retain a strong interest in the Middle Eastern avifauna and continue to publish on the taxonomy and distribution of the birds of this region.

The main focus of my current field work is South America and the Caribbean. In particular, I have been visiting Brazil regularly since 1995, spending up to six months per year there since 1998, both guiding birdwatchers and conducting research. Thus, for part of the year I am based in Rio de Janeiro, where my partner and I have a house in São Conrado. I have also travelled extensively elsewhere in the Neotropical region, especially to the Greater Antilles (over one year in the field in Cuba alone), Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico and Venezuela. I am a regular contributor to the periodical literature on Neotropical birds, and have published papers on distribution, taxonomy and biology. During the past 15 years, I have gained extensive field experience of most taxa in Brazil. Although available to guide trips throughout the country (and elsewhere, see 'Tour-leading'), my specialty is in the birds of the Atlantic Forest and the Caatinga and Cerrado biomes. For more information see the outline and some recent trip reports at http://www.freewebs.com/guykirwan/tourleading.htm.

I lead both scheduled trips (see, for instance, www.ornifolks.org) and privately organised groups, particularly in SE Brazil, but also elsewhere in Latin America, as well as in the Western Palearctic, where I am one of the foremost experts on Turkish birds.