Our Experts
Steve Milpacher
Steve has been a passionate advocate for parrot conservation and welfare for more than 30 years. He has a diverse background in business development, communications, and non-profit management. Steve joined the World Parrot Trust team in 2007 and is the Director of Operations. He also serves as a board member of the Canadian and New Zealand Parrot Trusts, Ara Manzanillo, and the Macaw Recovery Network. He has traveled extensively to observe wild parrots, has presented at international conferences and has written numerous articles for publication in magazines and journals. In his spare time, Steve is an enthusiastic wildlife photographer whose pictures have been published in magazines, books and calendars.
Dr Luis Ortiz-Catedral (Ph.D.)
Luis is the Director of the Oceania Conservation Program for the World Parrot Trust. He is a conservation biologist and wildlife manager specialising on recovering populations of threatened island vertebrates. He has studied wild parrots in New Zealand and Australia for 17 years. In the last decade, he has also led recovery programs for mockingbirds, iguanas and terrestrial snakes in the Galapagos Islands. Originally from Mexico, Luis completed his postgraduate studies in New Zealand focusing on translocation techniques for Kākāriki (parakeets). His research has contributed to developing a blueprint for Kākāriki translocations in New Zealand, and to a better management of pathogens in wild parrot populations.
Dr James Gilardi (Ph.D.)
Jamie is a conservation biologist specializing in behavioral and physiological ecology with special focus on tropical forest birds and marine vertebrates. He has studied wild parrots and other birds for more than 25 years, authoring a number of papers on ecology and parrots in the wild bird trade. He first did undergraduate studies where he researched the roles of juvenile mortality, nest defense, and parent-offspring conflict in the evolution of predatory bird reversed-size sexual dimorphism at the University of Washington and UC Santa Cruz. He then earned a Ph.D. in Ecology from UC Davis in parrot social behavior, foraging ecology, and soil eating in South-eastern Peru.