14/05/2010

Kathie and Mick Claydon (kandm.claydon@virgin.net) from the UK came on a Brown Bear and Birds Tour in Bulgaria from 5th to 12th May 2010. En route we were discussing the opportunities of seeing a bear. The expectations of the couple were not very high, provided the time we had planned and their experience with wildlife watching. Anyway, to increase their chances, Kathie and Mick had extended their trip with two days in addition to the itinerary suggested on our homepage. They were thinking it would be a bonus for them to see a bear on this tour, without expecting we would have the chance of seeing a bear in a couple of hours.

Once we arrived at our lodge we immediately packed our warm clothes and off we went to the hide to wait for the bears. The first animals that showed up in front of the hide were three Roe deer. At about 20.00 a large bear came out of the forest to the meadow in front of the hide. The animal started sniffing the tracks of a Roe deer that came at about 30 m from the hide. Following the tracks the bear approached the hide to about the same distance of 30 m as the Roe Deer. Then it just stood up. Looked around and showing his amazing large white patch on the upper chest. When standing the animals was over 2m high. The light was still good so we managed to see it incredibly well with our bins.

Except the bear, the mammals we saw during the trip were Wild Boars, Roe Deer, Badger, European Souslik, Chamois, Brown Hare, and Red fox and a few species of orchids and butterflies.

Apart from mammals, Kathie and Mick had marvelous views of the Wallcreeper at Trigrad Gorge, as well as other attractive birds like the Golden Eagle, Lesser spotted Eagle, Black Woodpecker, Bittern, Little Bittern, Common Crane, Garganey, Calandra Lark, Isabelline Wheatear, Crested Tit, Spotted Nutcracker, Rock Bunting etc. We also heard Grey-headed Woodpecker, Common Quail and Corncrake, which made a total of over 130 species seen and heard just within seven days.

News provided by Iordan Hristov, tour guide on this trip.

You can have a look at the trip report here