Viewing birds in their natural habitat is known as bird-watching or avitourism (Moss 2004). This practice developed mostly from a local pastime watching birds in one’s backyard or park to observing birds further afield. Various species or destinations are targeted by bird-watching tourists (Higham 1998). The 1990s saw an increase in the number of bird-watchers taking their hobby overseas in search of new species of birds (Connell 2009).
As a broader nature tourism niche, bird-watching forms a specialist market. As a result, it has traditionally been viewed as a homogenous group of people obsessed with seeing as many new species as possible. Despite this perception, more comprehensive research has uncovered that these tourists consists of a diverse population, with participants exhibiting varying levels of dedication and commitment to the activity (Connell 2009; Green and Jones 2010). Historically dominated by British and North American participants, the market is now becoming more...
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References
Biggs, D., J. Turpie, C. Fabricius, and A. Spenceley 2011 The Value of Avitourism for Conservation and Job Creation – An Analysis from South Africa. Conservation and Society 9:80-90.
Connell, J. 2009 Birdwatching, Twitching and Tourism: Towards an Australian Perspective. Australian Geographer 40(2):203-217.
Green, R., and D. Jones 2010 Practices, Needs and Attitudes of Bird-watching Tourists in Australia. Cooperative Research Centre for Sustainable Tourism. Brisbane: Griffith University.
Higham, J. 1998 Tourists and Albatrosses: The Dynamics of Tourism at the Northern Royal Albatross Colony, Taiaroa Head, New Zealand. Tourism Management 19:521-531.
Moss, S. 2004 A Bird in the Bush: A Social History of Birdwatching. London: Aurum.
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Steven, R., Jones, D. (2016). Birdwatching tourism. In: Jafari, J., Xiao, H. (eds) Encyclopedia of Tourism. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-01384-8_18
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