Tag: Hungary

It has been a great autumn for birding in the Hortobágy region. The very spectacular Crane season, where more than 150.000 Common Cranes are staging inside the Hortobágy National Park was again providing some unforgettable experience for birders visiting the area with seeing them on their night roost being the highlight of every birding tour this time. Of course, other specialities of the area still present at the same time and probably this time of the year is the best to see as many Eastern Imperial Eagles as possible in the region if someone is mainly after the raptors, although Saker Falcon is usually harder this time we still have good chances of finding one.
The other spectacle later Autumn is when the huge numbers of wild geese arriving from Siberia are flooding the area giving a great chance to find the endangered Lesser White-fronted Goose and Red-breasted Goose in the seemingly endless flocks of Greater White-fronted Goose. However, this year the geese were a bit late, fortunately, it seems they arrived in good number by the second half of November and both endangered species are now presenting in good numbers inside the safe borders of the Hortobágy National Park.

Our Bee-eater hide was excellent throughout June and most of July with some excellent actions. These colorful birds are always firm favorites for our guests and spending a few hours with their daily activity offers a great chance and unique experience. Europe’s most colorful birds usually arrive back in early May and start their activity around the breeding places. Normally from 15 or the latest from 20th May their photography can start. In 2024 it was an extreme years when the first Bee-eaters were observed as early as mid April in Hungary and the entire breeding season was early. We had fantastic mating activity already from 10th May and action never stopped until late July. Great fun! Come and join us for our June 2025 Hortobagy Bird Photography tour: https://www.sakertour.com/hide-photography/hungary-photo-tours/spring-summer-hide-photography-tour/#price-and-date

We finished our annual GT the first time excluding Slovakia from the itinerary, thus being one day shorter and visiting Hungary and Transylvania (Romania) only during the tour.
Our expectations were exceeded as we managed to record more species during the tour as on any previous one and broke the ‘record’ standing for 10 years as we managed to put down 234 bird species on our list.

Luckily all major highlights were seen, including 10 woodpecker and 9 owl species with the tricky Three-toed Woodpecker, the scarce White-backed Woodpecker included as well as the sought-after Ural Owl and Tengmalm’s Owl.
We birded the lowlands in Hungary with great wetlands giving us such great birds as Broad-billed Sandpiper and Great Snipe, while reaching higher altitude zones in the Carpathian Mountains in Romania where we saw Western Capercaillie, Eurasian Pygmy Owl and ‘Carpathian’ Brown Bears. The most scenic parts in Transylvania were the Békás Gorge where Wallcreeper was a dream bird for many of us to see and the Torockó Valley which held some trickier to see species like Sombre Tit and Common Rock Thrush.

Click here for the report of the tour with all the details and images give a concise reading what happened in 11 days of birding in Central Europe.