Peter Graham Kaestner (b. 1953 Baltimore, Maryland) is a retired

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

diplomat A diplomat (from grc, δίπλωμα; romanized ''diploma'') is a person appointed by a state or an intergovernmental institution such as the United Nations or the European Union to conduct diplomacy with one or more other states or internati ...

and amateur

ornithologist Ornithology is a branch of zoology that concerns the "methodological study and consequent knowledge of birds with all that relates to them." Several aspects of ornithology differ from related disciplines, due partly to the high visibility and th ...

who most recently served as the chief of the Consular Section at the U.S. Consulate General in Frankfurt, Germany. From May 2013 to 2014 he was the Senior Civilian Representative in Northern Afghanistan, based at Camp Marmal, Mazar-e Sharif. From 2009 to late 2012 he was a senior inspector in the Office of Inspector General of the U.S. State Department. From 2006 to 2009 he was the Minister Counselor for Consular Affairs of the American Embassy in New Delhi, India. As Minister Counselor, he oversaw consular operations in New Delhi and the U.S. Consulates Generals in Mumbai (Bombay), Chennai (Madras), Hyderabad, and Kolkata (Calcutta). He retired from the Foreign Service in August 2016. Born in

Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic, and the 30th most populous city in the United States with a population of 585,708 in 2020. Baltimore was ...

, in 1953 to Benjamin Henry Kaestner, Jr. and Alice (Reed) Kaestner, he is the middle child of 10 siblings and step-siblings. After spending two years in the Peace Corps in Zaire, Kaestner entered the Foreign Service in 1980, and has been assigned in the past to India, Egypt, Brazil,

Guatemala Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by H ...

, New Guinea, the Solomon Islands,

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

, Malaysia, and Namibia. In 1990 he had his first child with his wife Kimberly Vreeland Kaestner, Katherine Kaestner. In 1991 the couple had a second child, Laurel Kaestner. An avid birder, he has taken advantage of his position as an international diplomat to follow his hobby. By October 1986, he had become the first birder to see a representative of each bird family in the world and was recognized in the Guinness World Records. In 1989, while on a birding expedition near Bogota, Colombia, where he was a U.S. consular officer, he discovered a species new to science, the

Cundinamarca Antpitta The Cundinamarca antpitta (''Grallaria kaestneri'') is a species of bird in the family Grallariidae. It is endemic to Colombia. Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist montane forest. It is threatened by habitat loss Habitat ...

(''Grallaria kaestneri''), which was subsequently named after him. (''See''

Antpitta Grallariidae is a family of smallish passerine birds of subtropical and tropical Central and South America known as antpittas. They are between 10 and 20 cm (4–8 in) in length, and are related to the antbirds, Thamnophilidae, and gn ...

.) With a life list of more than 9,800 /9,800 /9,800 birds, Kaestner, in April 2023, weeks before turning 70, beat the world record of bird species seen in the wild.

References

* Koeppel, Dan. ''To See Every Bird On Earth: A Father, A Son, and a Lifelong Obsession'', (Penguin: 2005). 1953 births American ornithologists American diplomats Living people {{US-ornithologist-stub