Bulgaria: Bourgas wetlands, 5th May 2011

A day exploring the wetlands around the not-particularly-salubrious city of Bourgas. And despite the backdrop, they're pretty impressive wetlands!

During the day, a steady stream of raptors and other migrants passed overhead: Short-toed and Lesser Spotted Eagles, Levant Sparrowhawk, Red-footed Falcon, Bee-eaters, White and Black Storks, Honey Buzzards and hundreds of Steppe Buzzards.

The sun came out, for a change, and with it the butterflies: Eastern Dappled White were particularly common, with Small Copper, Grizzled and Mallow Skippers and Brown Argus all new for the trip.

Also enjoying the sun at the Poda reserve were an amazing number of snakes: we must have seen at least 40 Dice Snakes, 15 Grass Snakes and two massive (compared to any of the other snakes we've seen so far) Blotched Snakes in the rockier areas.

Our last stop of the day was on the shores of Mandra Lake, where a single Dalmatian Pelican sailed serenely past, tens of thousands of hirundines hawked over the water and a spectacular flight of 600+ White Pelicans passed overhead, returning from their day's fishing at some inland waterway.

Black Terns, Poda Nature Reserve

Eastern Dappled White

Bulgaria: Ropotamo, 3rd May 2011

Today was spent in the company of one of Bulgaria's best herpetologists and in one of the most herptile-species-rich areas in the country. Alas, the weather wasn't quite playing ball, and much of the day was fairly sun-free and slightly damp... and yet we still came home at the end of the day having seen 16 species, 2 more than can be found in the entire country back home!!

We started 'herptile day' with a bird... a massive adult White-tailed Eagle just by the road! And while watching him, we stumbled across our first 'herp' of the day (and a long-awaited 'tick' for me!), a big adult European Glass Lizard (photo above): a jumbo Slow Worm, kinda like a walking stick with the face of Voldemort!

And from there we didn't look back...

Nose-horned Viper #1, a female

Nose-horned Viper #2, a dark little male. He's about to shed his skin, hence the beautiful if slightly off-putting opaque blue eyes...

Eastern Grass Snake Natrix natrix persa, with two pale stripes running down the back.

Dice Snake

Eastern Slow Worm Anguis (fragilis) colchicus

Balkan Crested Newt Triturus karelinii

Eastern Spadefoot

Spur-thighed Tortoise

Bulgaria: Strandja, 2nd May 2011

A lovely day in one of the loveliest parts of Bulgaria, the Strandja mountains. At last the sun came out, and with in the lizards... of which, fingers crossed, many more tomorrow!

Other highlights of the day were a calling White-backed Woodpecker, a sadly dead Levantine Mole and some interesting plants. But the main highlight today must surely be the sun! At last!!

Meadow Lizard Darevskia praticola

Snake-eyed Skink Ablepharus kitaibelii

Balkan Wall Lizard Podarcis tauricus

Bulgaria: Veleka, 1st May 2011

May 1st, Snakes Day (according to a book of Bulgarian folklore we picked up in Varna...) when we're supposed to stamp around the village boundaries scaring off the snakes. Well, hopefully we'll not scare them too much, as the plan is to be joined by a local herpetologist in a couple of days time!

Meanwhile, we spent the day down towards the Turkish border, around the Veleka River.

Our first roadside stop revealed a fresh-in Roller perched in a small bush, with Woodchat Shrike and Cirl Bunting nearby also new for the trip.

Down at the river we were serenaded by the now-familiar songs of the Marsh Frogs and Nightingales. Some very nice woodland ground flora included the lovely Fritillaria pontica, a piece of plastic rubbish hid a small Grass Snake and a pair of Ortolan Buntings were in the scrub nearby.

Out at the river mouth, a small marsh provided a quick pit stop for a mixed group of waders, made up of 10 Wood Sandpipers, 3 Ruff, 2 each of Greenshank and Little Ringed Plover and a single Temminck's Stint. Meanwhile, at the back of the marsh, a European Pond Terrapin decided to take a walk across the meadow...

Heading homewards, we stopped at a rocky beach (which, by the smell, coincided with a small sewage outfall...) which had attracted a good group of marsh terns to wash and feed, as well as a single Little Stint, yet another wader for the trip list.

Finally, we paused at Arkutino Lake where massive numbers of hirundines fed low over the water, occasionally panicked by the local Hobby, and a single calling Penduline Tit gradually came closer and turned into a wonderful group of at least 6, showing brilliantly in the nearby willow scrub. A lovely end to another good day.

Fritillaria pontica

A longhorn beetle Pedestredorcadion pedestre, being suitably pedestrian and walking across the road...

Temminck's Stint

European Pond Terrapin, a little camera shy...

and a gorgeous little Penduline Tit. Blatantly not my photograph, alas, but copyright Mladen Vasilev, our guide on this trip. His website includes other photos taken on our tour (recent pictures, numbers 2948 onwards)

Bulgaria: Kavarna to Sozopol, 30th April 2011

Essentially a travelling day, moving from Kavarna in the north to Sozopol in the south, but with plenty of stops along the way.

At our first stop, Mladen picked out an adult Eagle Owl roosting on the cliff, while a piece of roadside wood revealed a lovely Balkan Green Lizard.

Next up was an impromptu roadside stop for a wonderful display of Summer Snowflake Leucojum aestivum together with the tall buttercup Ranunculus velutinus in an area of wet woodland. The woods also turned out to be home to Semi-collared Flycatcher, with a couple of singing males showing very well. And finally, an adult Aesculapian Snake put on a good performance, being very confiding.

The day's herptile theme continued at our stop in the oak woods, where two Eastern Green Lizards and a very friendly Agile Frog posed for photos while yet more Semi-collared Flycatchers sang and checked out nest sites. The local woodpeckers were a little shyer, but we did hear four species (Green, Great Spotted, Middle Spotted and Grey-headed), although only the Green put in an appearance.

Our journey also coincided with brilliant migration conditions (winds coming from the south east, several periods of warm blue skies enabling the soaring things to get over the Balkan Range). Birds seemed to be on the move all day (the most impressive 'vis-mig' I've ever seen), with just some of the highlights: a flock of around 30 Squacco Herons dropped in on the bay below our hotel just after breakfast; a nice Lesser Spotted Eagle low over at our lunch stop, followed five minutes later by a Short-toed Eagle; Black Terns passing overhead quite regularly; a wonderful flock of 96 Red-footed Falcons low over roadside fields. Not bad for a travel day!

Aesculapian Snake, Baltata

Agile Frog, Goritsa

Eastern Green Lizard, Goritsa

Semi-collared Flycatcher. Alas, the 5+ singing males seen during the day were all too high and too active to get a photo, so you'll just have to make do with this little female, fresh from inspecting a nest box.

Bulgaria: Kaliakra, 29th April 2011

One of those days that start well and then get better and better...

Despite a very civilised start time, we still managed to arrive at Cape Kaliakra before the general tourist arrival and had the place pretty much to ourselves. Amongst the interesting Byzantine ruins we had good views of three species of wheatear (Pied, Isabelline and Northern), with low flying Alpine Swifts buzzing us.



Just offshore attention first went to the birds, with good numbers of Black-throated Diver gathering together, many in smart breeding plumage, and smaller numbers of Black-necked Grebe and fly-past Yelkouan Shearwaters. We were then distracted from the birds by a small group of Harbour Porpoise (the endangered Black Sea sub-species) feeding some way offshore... and then, further out still, a pod of Bottle-nosed Dolphins moved through, heading purposefully north.

Moving back inland a bit, we had a stop on some fantastic flower-rich steppe grassland, where we soaked up the spectacle of the amazing colours of the dwarf irises (two species grow alongside each other, the pale yellow and sweetly smelling Iris suaveolens and the incredibly variable and slightly less scented Iris pumila), the dazzling yellow Adonis vernalis (photo above), the crimson Adonis flammea and the deep red Paeonia tenuifolia, a very special plant of the Pontic steppe just bursting into flower. Calandra Larks sang overhead, one or two fresh Swallowtails sheltered amongst the vegetation and a Spur-thighed Tortoise hunkered down, but the plants won the most admiration.







From the steppe, we dropped down into a wonderful hidden valley. While examining some otter spraint on the bridge at the bottom, I looked up to see an animal striding across the path a little further on... an animal with tabby stripes and a long, bushy, dark-tipped tail... rather amazingly, on my second visit to the area, my second Wild Cat! Even more amazingly, this one actually hung around long enough for everyone to get a look at him, as he paced through the vegetation, turned to look over his shoulder from a small rise and then dropped down into the reeds behind. Wow...

(what's even more amazing, only 20 minutes and less than 1km earlier, our driver had watched not one but two Wild Cats (presumably a mother and well-grown kitten) walk across the road in front of him, while we were all scrabbling about on the steppe nearby photographing the flowers! If you want to see a Wild Cat, get yourself to Bulgaria...)

Bulgaria: Shabla and Rusalka, 28th April 2011

Another day of mixed weather but great wildlife.

A pre-breakfast wander down to the beach revealed some amazingly showy Nightingales on territory and a typically drab (but actually rather exciting!) female Common Rosefinch passing through.

We started, in the rain, at Shabla Lake, with plenty of ducks including good numbers of very smart Ferruginous Ducks, some nice waders and some wonderfully smart male Collared Flycatchers in the bushes.

After lunch, we moved on to the archaeological reserve at Yailata, where distractions from the archaeology came in the form of a male Pied Wheatear, plenty of singing Calandra Larks, some close-in Yelkouan Shearwaters off shore, a great display of the lovely dwarf irises Iris pumila and a good population of (as yet still in bud) Peonia peregrina.

We ended the day on an area of surviving 'virgin' steppe, land never cultivated and almost carpeted in the wonderful little irises. Short-toed Lark sang overhead, a pair of Stone Curlews stalked around and a superb male Rock Thrush gave a great display as he hopped about on the steppe, somewhat lost on his way north. But even he couldn't compete with the irises...

Pied Wheatear. A lovely male, and a long-awaited 'tick'

Green Toad. So much smarter (and friendlier!) than the toads in Cyprus

Just some of the many colour variations of the superb Iris pumila, a lovely dwarf iris of the surviving areas of coastal steppe. For some reason, I only took photos of the purple colour varieties, but there were just as many yellows, creams and whites... more tomorrow!

Bulgaria: Lake Durankulak, 27th April 2011

A great day around Lake Durankulak, in the north of Bulgaria, an area I was last in in February 2010. Not the most scenic part of the world, with a definite feel of the Fens about the Dobruja Plains at times. But the wildlife more than made up for it...

The real spectacle was the marsh terns, with hundreds of White-winged Black Terns, smaller numbers of Black Tern and Little Gull, a handful each of Whiskered Tern and Mediterranean Gulls and a lovely pink pair of Slender-billed Gulls, all hawking over the reeds and open water.

Herons put on a good show too. Purple Herons flew back and forth, at least three Bitterns were around, a couple of Squacco Herons, a flight of 8 Great White Egrets and a lovely male Little Bittern which flew across a pool and then sat out in the open for everyone to get a good view.

A wonderful party of Red-footed Falcons were feeding over a ploughed field, following the tractor together with a White Stork.

In the reeds, several loud, croaking Great Reed Warblers were heard and seen, a Savi's Warbler briefly popped up and then straight back down again, and a singing Paddyfield Warbler was determined not to be seen, and very nearly managed it!

Oh yes, and then there were the flowers... some interesting arable weeds growing in the fishponds area included Ground Pine and the lovely, bright red Adonis flammea (photo above).

Not bad for a first day...