Birding & Photography Hotspots: The Danube Delta – Part Two

View Dobrogea & Danube Delta Hot Spots in a larger map Nesting habitat of Pied Wheatear near Cheia. © Gyorgy Szimuly CheiaFor those not planning to visit the Macin Mountains National Reservation this site is worth to visit. Only a short by-pass from the main road coming from Constanta and a lovely limestone hill makes

Birding & Photography Hotspots: The Danube Delta – Part One

I have grown up in a small village laying along the Danube River in NW Hungary. My link to the river is as old as I started birding at my age of 10 despite I moved from my homeland. During a theoretical 1730 km long travel from my home village along the river I can

Snow Bunting flock

Yesterday my friend wrote me about his observation of a bigger flock of Snow Bunting around the wind power station near Nagyigmánd, NW Hungary. This morning I decided to visit the site which is just 10 km away from my home. I picked up Péter Szeimann, my birding friend, and we drove to the area.

Tundra Swan Day

Well, 3 hours sleeping before an almost day long birding day doesn’t seem to be enough. Anyway I had a beautiful day with two of my kids. Kea stayed home this time with Andi. We targeted the Danube river as some nice birds were reported during the whole week. Actually two hotspots have been visited.

Midwinter Waterbird Counts 2009/2010

This was the only sunny day we have had for weeks. Excellent timing for the annual Midwinter Waterbird Census. As usual in every mid-week-end of January most of the European birdwatchers count wildfowl (waterbirds). In some countries this is also the time to count the White-tailed Eagles as well. Greater White-fronted Geese. © Gyorgy Szimuly

What a strong start – first Oriental Turtle Dove for Hungary

Yesterday an interesting record appeared on birding.hu as an European Turtle Dove is present in NW Hungary. As discussion started about this record some documentary image has been uploaded by the observer. It soon became obvious that the bird wasn’t an European Turtle Dove but the Central Asian race, the meena of the Oriental Turtle

New image gallery added

Common Starling © Gyorgy Szimuly I have finally started to add the reprocessed images into a new gallery. This is far not the best solution but my website development doesn’t progress well and I could not wait for it anymore. The thumbnailed species taxonomy structure will help for easy overview and entry to the species

Is it a good start?

In the first days of the new year many birders got happy by successfully twitching a real mega, a first ever for Hungary, the White-winged Snowfinch Montifringilla nivalis. It was found just before the New Year’s Eve at the Fort of Somoskö, (SE Slovakia) (sadly the fort was separated from the Hungarian village Somoskö in

Birding on the 1st day of a new decade

I don’t keep birding on the first day of the year a tradition but if I have a chance I go out. Today the weather was too pleasant to stay home so we decided to take Kea and the binocular out. Birding wise, the little bit more than an hour outing, was surprisingly productive. I

A White-winged Snowfinch tick for Hungary

So I gave the first mega of this year, the White-winged Snowfinch, another chance to see. This morning I was kindly offered to join by a young local birder and we again visited the Fort of Somoskő. The trip wasn’t free of worry as there was a massive snowfall all the night and which continued