The winter has swindled the birds. This was the main conclusion of the mid-winter counting of all swimming birds in Bulgaria. Winter has turned out very frisky this year. In the beginning it was quite mild and this type of weather lasted until the first days of February. Later the winter decided that snow suits it more- the temperatures dropped significantly and the landscape was covered in white and beautiful coat. However, weather forecasts show that a new warm period is on the way to Bulgaria. Perhaps the real winter will arrive to the country in the beginning of the spring or it may never come this year.

Let us now focus our attention at the birds. This winter the marshlands near the Danube River and along the Bulgarian Black Sea coastline lack the exceptionally beautiful red breasted geese (branta rufficolis). Usually, nearly the whole world population of this rare type which is now endangered of extinction spends the winter in Bulgaria. This year only 5,000 red breasted geese were counted, while in past years they amounted to 35,000!!! Perhaps due to the warm winter these birds have chosen to spend the season somewhere north- in Ukraine or Romania. The red breasted geese nest in Siberia, but later usually spend the winter in Bulgaria’s marshlands. Experts from the Bulgarian Society for the Protection of Birds also noted other odd phenomena this year. Many storks have also forgotten to fly away from Bulgaria and can now be seen swimming in many dams and rivers in the northern part of Bulgaria. The swallow (Delichon urbicum) has also chosen to stay in Bulgaria. The swans which are usually spotted in the southern parts of Bulgaria can now be seen in Northern Bulgaria. Another alarming fact is that pelicans for example have already started to form love couples and the new generation is on the way. The same behavior was noticed in some wild geese and ducks. “They will start laying eggs in several weeks and if unusual frost appears in late February or March, the eggs will get frozen”, Chairman of the Bulgarian Society for the Protection of Birds Petar Yankov alarms. “The warm period this winter has swindled all these birds and if this is followed by a cold wave, they will go through a very hard period. One of the small things we could do for them is to join the Grain of Love campaign of the BSPB which encourages us for the fifth consecutive year to make bird feeders for the songbirds and fill them on a regular basis with sunflower seeds. Parus, woodpeckers, sparrows, robins (Erithacus rubecula) and Eurasian Jay (Garrulus glandarius) could hardly survive if snow covers the whole country. Parus for instance is the only natural rival of the leaf-mining moth which attacks the trees. Each day a parus eats a quantity of such insects equaling to its own weight. In the period when a parus family feeds its newly-hatched chicks it can eat up to several hundred kilograms of insects! However, this small and beautiful bird needs our help to survive. Last year the Bulgarian Society for the Protection of Birds launched 40 workshops for the making of bird feeders in 11 Bulgarian towns. Thousands of children from schools and kindergartens, parents and pensioners joined the noble initiative.

Swimming birds are also among the most attractive species for hunting during the winter period. However, their absence this year made the Bulgarian hunters nervous and disappointed. No wonder why poaching flourishes in such cases. Several prays to poachers were brought to the Rescue Center for Wild Animals of Green Balkans Association in the city of Stara Zagora. There was a young sea eagle (Haliaeetus albicilia) and an imperial eagle (Aquila heliaca) among the poachers’ prey. The imperial eagle was rescued at that center. However, unfortunately, the wounds of the sea eagle turned fatal. It was the seventh large bird brought to the rescue center for the past two months.

English version: Kostadin Atanasov