Bulgaria diary

I work pretty much exclusively with seabirds (with the odd bit of cetacean work thrown in for good measure), so a chance to go and do something completely different in the Rila mountains in Bulgaria was too good to miss. Here's a summary of my late October adventure into the forests...

October 24th

After flying into Sofia late the previous night and spending the night at an airport hotel I was keen to get out and see some real Bulgaria and some real Bulgarian birds. At 9:30 I was picked up and driven from Sofia to the small city of Razlog, a couple of hours away, sitting between the Rila and Pirin massifs. The sun shone and as the scenery became more and more hilly, I became more and more excited.

I was 'handed over' to the survey team in Razlog and after a quick lunch we set off into the hills. Not far out of town we hit the unmade roads and it seems we spent the next 12 hours bouncing up and down rutts and rivulets. Once we got into suitable habitat the real reason for me being there - woodpecker (and owl) surveys kicked off, and it wasn't long before we'd enticed a response out of a black woodpecker. These are remarkable birds in many ways but the way they vanished through the forest was staggering. This invisibility was coupled with the most incredible wing noise - long before seeing a bird or hearing it call you could track them through the forest by the sound of their wings. Along with the black woodpecker I was familiarising myself with the common birds of the forest - among them marsh and crested tits, crossbills and nuthatches, ravens and jays.

As well as the birds there were signs of other forest residents, such as areas rooted out and turned over by wild boar. It was just beyond one of these that I got my first real surprise. A movement on the ground by the side of the track, an emergency stop and before I knew it I had the bins up onto a cracking hazel grouse. Once the dust settled the bird did too and we got great views of it as slowly slinked off. I knew there were hazel grouse in these woods but I never expected to see one, and certainly not as well as we had seen this one. If only I'd remembered to take my camera out of the back of the car...

Up until nightfall we continued to survey for woodpeckers, and had further encounters with black woodpecker and of course the ubiquitous great spotted. With dusk falling we switched into owl mode - specifically Tengmalm's owl. The plan was to do 'playback' of singing males and listen for the rather jackdaw like 'Kyow' cals in response, but the owls were a couple of steps ahead of us and we heard a couple of good 'Kyow's as we ate our supper around the jeep! We also got a decent response from a couple of birds and it was a pleasure to record these calls in such a silent environment.

So - an exhausting but amazing day, but it wasn't to end there. After a long and bumpy ride back down the mountain, a familiar but unplaceable shape trotted across the road in front of us. I was unhappy calling it a fox but thats as close as I could get it - but then Krasi uttered the word 'Jackal' from the driver seat next to me and it all fell into place. A golden-backed jackal! What a way to end a brilliant first day.

October 25th

Another day in the hills, and more woodpecker surveys. It started slowly but even so, it was still pretty pleasant stopping in the hills every so often and listening to the common forest birds. It also gave me an opportunity to catch up with the butterflies I'd been seeing from the car the day before - and I was chuffed to see that they were my first nettle-tree butterflies.

However by early afternoon things began to hot up a little. A goshawk called while we ate lunch, before we set off on our first walking transect. Not many stops in and we'd found a responsive black woodpecker, and shortly after that we found hazel grouse feathers at a known dust bathing spot for them. As we climbed higher up the hill, the track got narrower and the forest became older, wilder, and more majestic. And the wildlife improved too. Nutcrackers were heard calling in the distance and eventually one came in close and showed really well, if briefly.

Unfortunately the hoped-for three toed woodpecker never materialised, but we were in for a treat at the top of the track. Georgi picked up on a weak call that I half heard and suggested it sounded a bit like a pygmy owl. One quick blast of tape later and we were getting a lovely close response from a hidden pygmy owl, with only the attendant swarm of angry tits and goldcrests to indicate roughly where it was. And then a movement caught my eye and there it was! This livid looking coffee cup sized owl, staring down at me as I swore and rattled off pictures and pointed my microphone all at the same time. We had about 15 minutes in the company of this little terror before it moved off, although before too long it had returned and was singing in the trees above our heads once more. Again I managed to get reasonable views of it and got some nice recordings, once again aided by the crisp, calm silence of the forest on a still evening.

One of the first recordings I made when the owl was surrounded by furious tits, treecreepers and goldcrests.

And as dusk arrived, we were treated to another bout of song after all of the small passerines had gone to bed. Note the nutcracker calling in the background!

We also had a bit of close up scale calling - an autumn speciality. What a way to end a wonderful day in the hills.

October 26th

My final day in the field and this time we were to walk in the lower level beech and oak forests. I'd considered them to be less exciting that the upland pinewoods but by the time we were half way up the hill, the scenery was so stunning that I was just happy to be there. Green and golden canopies, broad trunks and a floor carpeted in copper leaves. The wildlife would turn out to be OK too...

First up was a distant calling middle-spotted woodpecker, followed by a much closer if a little brief black woodpecker.

One more each of middle spot and black woodpeckers, nettle-tree butterflies and a couple of rock buntings on the way up were making for a pretty good day out - but the best was yet to come. Near the top of the hill we came as close as I'd like to a bear! We didn't see one of course but fresh tracks were still pretty exciting!

On the way back down we heard a distant calling black woodpecker and as we approached the car a movement through the trees caught my attention. I picked up a reasonable sized bird perched on a branch and expected it to be a mistle thrush - as we'd seen plenty through the day, However, as the bins focussed I realised that this bird was green. I shifted slightly so I could see its head and was delighted to see the face of a grey-headed woodpecker staring at me. I hadn't expected one here but apparently this mix of trees, including some soft woods, was perfect. I considered myself very lucky and got into the car, settling in for the long drive back to Sofia. Not 500 metres down the road a woodpecker flashed up from low down somewhere, perching up on a trunk. It was clearly a dendrocropus but without the large white patches on the back - it was barred instead. I realised it had to be a 'Lilfords' white-backed woodpecker (a species I'd unsuccessfully searched for in the Pyrenees) and started yelling as much in the car! We stopped in time for me to relocate it and rattle off a couple of record shots (i'm not sure the guys would have believed me if I hadn't as this bird was well out of suitable habitat). This was perhaps the bird I'd wanted most from this trip (along with three-toed) and the manner in which I got it made for a perfect end to this amazing short trip. I'm already coming up with ways of wangling another work trip...