Thirty-five years ago, it was anybody’s guess what German reunification would mean for conservation in the former German Democratic Republic: would hyper-development follow the rush of western money, or would it be possible to preserve the wilder areas and traditional land uses that had survived in the East? The confrontation between economic aspiration and habitat conservation could hardly have been starker.
But in spite of the inevitable compromises, eastern Germany, thirty-five years after reunification, retains an impressive variety of natural and anthropogenic habitats and the birds that go with them—at this season, including tens of thousands of Common Cranes and bean geese alongside such breathtaking specialties as Bearded Reedlings and Common Kingfishers. Beyond those natural riches, this enchanting landscape also preserves splendid architectural monuments, and it is home to some of the finest museums in the world.
VENT’s well-loved tour of Brandenburg and Berlin, based in a single four-star hotel in leafy and historic Charlottenburg, combines an exploration of the region’s natural history and its wealth of cultural treasures from the Middle Ages to the present day. With excellent accommodation and food and an easy daily routine, this tour is ideal for birders and their non-birding spouses, friends, and traveling companions alike.
His numerous scholarly publications include two books on the Latin animal literature of the later Middle Ages. Among Rick's recent books are the ABA Field Guide to Birds of New Jersey and the ABA Field Guide to Birds of Arizona; his Peterson Reference Guide to American Sparrows was published in 2019. He is also the co-author with Sanford Sorkin of Watching Birds in Montclair and Watching Birds in the New Jersey Meadowlands. Especially interested in the history and culture of birding, he is hard at work on a study of hummingbird collecting in France from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. In his spare time, he teaches Latin courses online for the Paideia Institute. Rick lives with his family, Alison Beringer and Avril Huang, and their black lab, Quetzal, in northern New Jersey, where he offers private birding tours to the marshes, woodlands, and ocean beaches.
