Bulgaria - various places Part 2

[Ilian Velikov]

Struma valley
I’m labeling this ‘Struma valley’ not because we went searching through the whole valley but because the spot we went to (thanks Jeroen!) should be kept a secret! We stayed in a village higher up in the Pirin mountains, and every day we went down to the river to fish or search for herps! Unfortunately, due to the “bad” weather we couldn’t find my top three species, but I’m still happy since we found other interesting things, plus the place is beautiful! The most common species here was Podarcis erhardii, closely followed by Lacerta viridis and there were, of course, some Pelophylax ridibundus too! Here we also found Natrix natrix, Dolichophis caspius, Rana graeca, Bombina variegata, Testudo hermanni and Testudo graeca.

Etropole
This is my girlfriend’s hometown and it’s situated 12 km away from my hometown – Pravetz. On a short walk there we found (should I mention it?) P.ridibundus, a juvenile Natrix natrix and a nice surprise for me – Triturus arntzeni.

Svode
This is a small village on the river Malak Iskar, where we often go fishing. It was the last day of our stay in Bulgaria, so we went there to fish and I had decided that I will not be herping this time! On our way, I just went to snap a few shots of a P.muralis population I know of, and then set myself on the shore with my fishing rod! The weather was too hot even for fish, so there was not even a bite on my rod, so I decided I’ll change the location. I went a few meters downstream, and just before I put some bait on my hook I saw a brown snake tail disappearing in the grass, just on the water edge! I grabbed the tail, then mid body and pulled out a nice Zamenis longissimus! It was a nice and unexpected finish to our vacation in Bulgaria!

List of species:

Amphibians

P.ridibundus
B.bufo
R.dalmatina
R.temporaria
R.graeca
B.variegata
T.arntzeni

Reptiles:

A.fragilis
L.viridis
P.muralis
P.erhardii
N.natrix
N.tessellata
D.caspius
Z.longissimus
E.orbicularis
T.hermanni
T.graeca

[Mario Schweiger]

Very nice landscapes!
A country, I have to visit soon!

Nice herp pics too
Mario

[Ilian Velikov]

Thanks,Mario! Yes, you definitely should visit! But you should go in spring or early summer, when all the yellow you see in this photos will be green!

Here are some more, specially for you:

At the back you can see mount 'Vihren" - Second highest peak on the Balkan Peninsula.

[Bobby Bok]

Very nice Illian, the Rana graeca is my favourite!

[Mario Schweiger]

Ilian,

how I should find the asps, when all the grass is green and high
For sure, I will visit Bulgaria during spring!

Mario

[Ilian Velikov]

Thanks,Bobby! I enjoyed R.graeca,too!

Mario, believe me the dry yellow grass there is much taller than the green one!
After finding aspis, you may want to look around for ursinii, too !

[Paul Lambourne]

Illian,

Great couple of reports. Love the rusty bufo .. its seems that everywhere is so dry at the moment.. you did very well to score so many amphibs.. especially the Triturus arntzeni.

Cheers Paul

[Ilian Velikov]

Thanks, Paul!

Yes, it was very dry and I was surprised to find T.arntzeni, too! It was a near a small overgrown puddle, under a small pile of trash together with the juvenile N.natrix!

[Thomas Bader]

What a beautiful area! The caspius is really breathtaking!

[Ilian Velikov]

Thanks Thomas! The caspius was really beautiful (and agressive as usual), about 1,60 m, and we found it by chance! I almost touched him with my head while going under the branch it was resting on, when my father spotted it! It allowed me to get very close to it before it tried to get away from the branch! The tree where we found it was in a shady , rocky gorge with a cool stream flowing beneath. The snake was obviously seeking shade and moisture.

in-situ