Kenn Kaufman (born 1954) is an American author, artist, naturalist, and conservationist, known for his work on several popular field guides of birds and butterflies in North America.
Born in South Bend, Indiana, Kaufman started birding from the age of six. When he was 9, his family moved to Wichita, Kansas, where his fascination with birds only intensified. At age sixteen, inspired by birding pioneers such as Roger Tory Peterson, he dropped out of high school and began hitchhiking around North America in pursuit of birds. Three years later, in 1973, he set the record for the most North American bird species seen in one year (671), though this record included regions like Baja California that are no longer ornithologically considered part of North America, and it has since been surpassed. His cross-country birding journey, covering some eighty thousand miles, was eventually recorded in a memoir, Kingbird Highway.
Subsequently, he focused his work on creating and expanding upon birding field guides. In 1992, he was given the Ludlow Griscom Award by the American Birding Association. Kaufman also received the ABA Roger Tory Peterson Award in 2008 for a "lifetime of achievements in promoting the cause of birding."[1]
Kaufman currently resides in Oak Harbor, Ohio. His wife's name is Kimberly.
Kenn Kaufman, as a youth worked at Quivira Scout Ranch, near Sedan,Kansas. QSR is a wilderness camp, where Kenn was a Nature Director and taught Bird Study merit badge, as well as many others. He created the first and only Quvira Council bird species list for this 3,500 acre camp, and his influence is still highly regarded today. Today Kenn writes for Birds and Blooms, Bird Watcher's Digest, and works/volunteers at the Black Swamp Bird Observatory.