Hugo Santa Cruz

Hugo Santa Cruz is a Bolivian naturalist with more than 20 years guiding experience and roughly a decade focused specifically on bird tours. Trained in Ecotourism and Protected Areas Management, he is based in the city of Santa Cruz de la Sierra and runs Bolivia Birding Expeditions, a fully Bolivian-owned operator that he has built around custom itineraries spanning the country's twelve ecoregions. Hugo is comfortable across all of Bolivia, from the lowland Amazon, Chaco and Pantanal to the inter-Andean dry valleys and the high puna around Lake Titicaca. He is particularly fond of falcons (including Forest Falcons and migrating Peregrines) and has extensive experience producing high-species-count itineraries that target both Bolivia's two endemic macaws and a long list of Andean specialties. Outside Bolivia he has also guided birders in Costa Rica and Panama. He is profiled in 10,000 Birds' "Bird Guides of the World" series, where he candidly describes himself as more interested in field work than self-promotion. Clients tend to reach him directly by email or WhatsApp rather than through a heavily marketed brand.