A 12-day bird photography tour providing excellent conditions to take pictures of colourful and attractive European birds, such as the Egyptian and Griffon Vultures, Black-winged Stilt, European Roller, European Bee-eater, Common Cuckoo, European Turtle Dove, Middle Spotted Woodpecker, Black-headed Bunting, Red-backed Shrike, Semi-collared Flycatcher, Eurasian Penduline Tit, Eurasian Golden Oriole and many others

This tour includes 5 different regions in Bulgaria – the Danube area, the Eastern Balkan range, the Black Sea coast, the Sakar Hills and the Eastern Rhodope Mountains. We take photos from fixed (permanent) hides, tent-hides and vehicles. We normally do early morning and late afternoon photo-sessions to get the best possible light for photography, and we make the transfers to different areas in the mid-day hours.

We start with the Danube river area in the northern part of the country, where the loess cliffs provide home to numerous Bee-eater colonies and a spectacular number of breeding Rollers. These two colorful bird species will be our main targets for photography while we are here.

Then we move further east, to the Eastern Balkan Mountain Range, through a variety of habitats – oak forests, orchards, wildlife-friendly managed meadows and farmlands. Here we will be aiming to capture a number of forest and farmland birds, such as the Common Cuckoo, Turtle Dove, Eurasian Golden Oriole, Red-backed Shrike, Hawfinch, Sombre Tit and a good selection of woodpeckers, including the European Green Woodpecker, Middle Spotted Woodpecker, Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, Syrian Woodpecker and Eurasian Wryneck.

We continue our tour  to the southern Bulgarian Black Sea coast, where we will spend a couple of days in the area of the Bourgas wetlands. There we have very good opportunities for capturing Great White Pelicans, Pygmy Cormorant, Squacco and Purple Herons and a variety of shore-birds, like the Black-winged Stilt, Pied Avoset, Kentish Plover, Marsh Sandpiper, Little Tern, Sandwich Tern, etc. If in the first half of May – this area provides very good opportunities to photograph the three species of marsh terns – Whiskered, Black and White-winged terns. The Yellow Wagtail (the black-headed ssp feldegg) and Eurasian Penduline Tit will be in our focus here too.

On the way to the southern coast of Bulgaria we make a stop at the oak forests of the Eastern Balkan Range to photograph the Semi-collared Flycatcher.

The Sakar Hills is another site included in this tour. There we usually take very good flight shots of Eastern Imperial Eagles and Long-legged Buzzards, feeding on the Souslik colonies in the area. A great variety of passerines can be photographed here, including the Black-headed Bunting, Red-backed and Woodchat shrikes, Isabelline Wheatear and with a little bit of luck we may take excellent photos of the Masked Shrike and Ortolan Bunting too.

Finally we move on to the Eastern Rhodope Mountains. There we make use of our special hide for capturing Eurasian Black (Cinereous), Griffon and Egyptian vultures feeding on carcass. There are very good chances of photographing other birds of prey coming to the carcass, like the White-tailed Eagle and Black Kite. We also survey the cliff formations in the area for the Eastern Black-eared Wheatear. We can put tent-hides along the Arda river, where depending on the water level we may try to capture Black Storks feeding in the river.

This tour itinerary can be changed on the spot depending on the weather conditions and the success in photographing the target birds of the tour participants.

On this tour we will visit colorful meadows, sand dunes and shrub habitats, which are full of flowers, butterflies, reptiles and other wildlife providing opportunities for enjoyable macro-photography too.

This 12-day itinerary for bird photography in Bulgaria can be customised depending on your target species and the time you are willing to spare.

If you wish to join one of our scheduled Spring Bird Photography in Bulgaria tours, please check the availability.