Vote now! Presenting the 2025 NUTTER Award Nominees before 22 Feb

Another year, another reason to celebrate what really makes mammalwatching special: obsession, generosity, weekly summaries and a slightly unhealthy willingness to lose sleep for fleeting views of fur.

During the community meeting in January, we selected the nominees for the NUTTER Mammalwatching Awards: The award for Mammalwatching’s most Notable, Unique, Tantalizing, Tenacious and Enlightening Reports.

These awards are not about lists, numbers, or ticking boxes. They are about outstanding trip reports, unforgettable field experiences, inspiring conservation projects, and the guides and individuals who quietly (or not so quietly) raise the bar for all of us. All reports published in 2025 were eligible.

Last year’s winners are here, their names forever enshrined in the Mammalwatching Hall of Heroes.

Once again thanks to projectfelis.org, especially Valentin and Ruben, and all participants of the community meeting for selecting and organizing the awards.

By the way, you can already nominate someone for the NUTTER awards for this year! Most likely we will have the following categories (but as always they are decided together in the community meeting): Best Report; Best Storytelling (new category); Most Inspiring Conservation Project / Person / Place; Best First Report; Outstanding Guide; Best and Worst Mammalwatching Moment; Best Exploration, Services to Mammalwatching; and Best Photography in a Report (s).

Please feel free to nominate a report anytime via mail to info@projectfelis.org.

With so many great reports in 2025 it was difficult to select a shortlist and we spent an unreasonable amount of time preparing it. But now it is your chance to shape history and select the winner. You can vote until the 22 February using this Google poll:

https://forms.gle/PVsK1Pmevc69Kdx37

Valentin & Jon (cover photo Sebastian Kennerknecht)

And so, as they say in the Oscars, the nominees are:

Best Report

Venkat Sankar – USA
California Big Year: Trying to see as many species in California as possible in one Year with a very extensive report
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/california-mammal-big-year-site-id-guides/

Mike Richardson – Kenya
Detailed report with great formatting (easy to read), many species and beautiful pictures
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/mammal-watching-in-central-kenya/

Rob Jansen & Romy Jansen-Houtzager – Malaysia & Singapore
Another useful report with maps, drawings and a lot of information. Great photos as well
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/its-a-wild-life-trip-report-malaysia-singapore-june-july-2024/

Demian Hiß, Valentin Moser, Michel Kilcher and Milan Pestalozzi – Northwest Africa
Long and detailed report covering many species for the region plus helpful maps
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/northwest-africa-2025/

Daan Druiker – Philippines
Another of Daan’s meticulous reports that also touched on sites not visited and species not seen. Nice pictures, ID-pointers and maps
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/palawan-and-calamianes-mammals-and-birds/

Most Inspiring Conservation Project / Person / Place 

1StopBorneo Wildlife – running workshops for mammalwatching & bat photography
A great many projects underway including running bat photography workshops with researchers and running a mammalwatching workshop for the Sabah tourism industry
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/the-bats-of-sabah-report-of-bat-workshops-from-charles-francis-1stopborneo-wildlife/

Dibatag United Football Team Shirts – Ethiopia
Donation of football jerseys to the local football team to promote pride in the Dibatag
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/introducing-gerdame-united-save-the-dibatag/

KAFS – Kianjavato Ahmanson Field Station – Madagascar
Lots of great work including tree planting that protects habitat for Sucker-footed Bats and Aye-ayes
https://www.mammalwatching.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Madagascar-Trip-Report-2024.pdf

Dr Ating Solihin – Dr Ating Foundation – Sulawesi
For his inspiring and successful work to conserve the endangered Togian Babirusa
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/the-mammalwatching-podcast-returns-expedition-to-sulawesi/

Wise Birding – Brazil
Donating a share of profits to conservation initiatives such as this one in Emas NP
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/brazil-emas-np-and-south-pantanal-july-2024/

Best First Report

Claudia W – Georgia & Armenia
Interesting report with maps, great pictures and useful details from the visited sites
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/georgia-and-armenia-august-2025/

Jake Barker – UK
Aussie on tour in the UK, well written, with bat sonograms and coordinates
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/united-kingdom-2025/

Zac Babbit – South Africa
An impressive first report from a professional guide from South Africa, with an exceptional species count
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/2025-south-africa-roadtrip-two-months-130-mammal-species/

Asanoth – Thailand
Nice report with many useful details and links to sightings on iNat
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/thailand-december-25th-to-january-8th/

Flemming Versloot – India
Long report with nice pictures and useful details for each site
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/trip-report-india-pench-kaziranga-and-nameri-np-hoollongapar-kakoijana-forest-reserves/

Outstanding guide

Europe / North America / Australia

Juan Cruzado Cortes – Mexico
A dedicated biologist who knows Mexico very well and has led groundbreaking trips finding mammals never photographed before

Janos Olah – Sakertours
A birder who has seen the light. Janos has developed some fabulous mammalwatching trips and opened up Romanian mammals to the world

Frédéric Chiche – France/Spain
Frédéric is a small carnivore specialist, with exceptional knowledge in this area that helps clients observe and photograph shy species rarely seen well otherwise

Jonathan Rodriguez Ramiro – Spain
Jonathan is an amazing guide who knows where and when to find the animals, not only in his home region near Riano, but in all of Spain. On top of that he’s a great guy with a fantastic sense of humour, extremely fun and knowledgeable. His motto: “hotels are only for sleeping, time should be spent in the field”.

Africa, Asia, Latin America

Jirayu Ekkul – Thailand
Jirayu has done a lot to open up Thailand, finding reliable sites for some great mammals including the hitherto impossible Banded Linsang.

Aovick Dasgupta – India (Kaziranga)
Aovick is a dedicated, funny and knowledgeable guide who goes beyond the expected, standing out from other guides in the area.

Marcelo Gavesnky – Argentina
Marcelo is opening up Argentina to mammalwatching: hard working, enthusiastic and dedicated to the cause, plus an exceptionally nice human.

Robert Nkantor – Ghana
Robert has played an important role in opening Ghana up to mammalwatchers and is known as a pangolin whisperer; he’s developed a method of finding both species of tree pangolins.

Alex Guevara – Panama
Alex is an outstanding guide and super knowledgeable about mammals, birds and herps, and he will work very hard to make sure that you see your targets.

Best and Worst Mammalwatching Moment

Petter Bohmans – Europe
Mammal streak: Try to find a new mammal per week
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/mammal-streak-a-challenging-way-of-mammalwatching/

Jon Hall – Romania
Staring into empty holes for hours in the cold waiting for mole rats
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/zen-and-the-art-of-mole-rats-romania-april-2025/

Demian Hiß, Valentin Moser, Milan Pestalozzi – Morocco
Searching empty wells (for seasonal water storage) for surviving gerbils, amidst dead cats and hedgehogs
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/northwest-africa-2025/

Ian Thompson – Kenya
Getting attacked by army ants in a bat cave filled with guano (but no bats)
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/kenya-october-2025/

The Travelling Zoologists (Karina and Andrey) – Paraguay
A convincing April Fools’ Day post from Paraguay
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/trip-teport-armadillos-of-the-reserva-la-enganosa/

Best Exploration

Charles Foley, Jon Hall, Alex Meyer and Ian Thompson – Djibouti
Underexplored for sure
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/djibouti-december-2024/

Sebastian Kennerknecht – Tonga
Swimming with Humpback Whales
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/humpback-whales-of-tonga-whale-expeditions-trip-report-2024/

Cheryl Antonucci – Peru and others
Primate explorations all over the world
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/peru-2025-trip-report/

Jan Ebr – French Guiana
First report from the country
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/french-guiana-2024-2025/

Jirayu Ekkul – Thailand
Banded Linsang site
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/thailands-deep-south-banded-linsang-and-more-2025/

Services to Mammalwatching

A Photo-Identification Guide to Duikers and Other African Forest Antelopes
It’s great to have specialists making knowledge accessible by providing resources for hard-to-identify groups
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/a-photo-identification-guide-to-duikers-and-other-african-forest-antelopes/

Venkat Sankar
For his rodent and bat identification prowess and all his help to this community.

Nils Bouillard for Bat ID guide of Oman and continued help with bat identification 
Nils has consistently helped out the community with help, for example the Bat ID guide of Oman
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/bats-of-oman-acoustic-data-collected-during-a-birdwatching-trip/

Carlos Bocos
Services to mammalwatching in Asia and Spain, with pioneering trips to destinations in recent years including West Papua, Papua New Guinea and Sulawesi

Daan Drukker
Services to squirrels and beyond, for example the guide to West African squirrels
https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/squirrel-field-guide-western-africa/

Best Photography in a Report

Ralf Bürglin – Morocco

https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/meeting-mammals-in-morocco/

Daniel Benák, Jonathan Ben Simon, Alex Meyer and more – Azores

https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/amazing-azores-alex-meyer-july-2025/

Lewis Burnett – Drynandra (Western Australia)

https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/dryandra-woodlands-np-guide-numbats-quolls-and-more/

Sebastian Kennerknecht – Estonia, Chile, Mongolia

Many great reports. For example: https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/eurasian-lynx-in-estonia-cat-expeditions-trip-report-2025/

Coke Smith – Australia and China

Many reports including Sichuan and a series of reports from Australia including https://www.mammalwatching.com/community-post/tasmania-segment-1-of-the-great-pouched-critter-safari-of-2025/