Ari Latja

Ari was born in 1954 in Tampere, Finland, and it was there that he started watching birds. His first great interest was watching bird migrations, and Ari made several 2-week trips to the southern headland of Porkkala to see the 'arktika' – the mass migration of Arctic waders and waterfowl through the Baltic. For the last 15 years his avian interests have centered on ringing, mostly at the bird observatory at Hoytiainen canal. Ari was chairman of the Northern Karelia Birdwatching Society for a number of years, and is still a member of the board. In 1997, Ari attended Finnature's 8-month International Bird Guide course, after which he began leading bird tours. Since then he has travelled to Kenya, Georgia (Caucasus), Israel, France and the United States among other places. In 2000, he spent two months in England where he was involved with bird conservation work, as well as spending time in the field bird watching. Ari acts as a consultant on bird inventories for local environmental officials, and lectures in Zoology at the University of Joensuu.