A brigade in support of the vultures in Central Balkan

The vulture restaurant is built near the vulture adaptation aviary and is maintained by Green Balkans within the Vultures Return in Bulgaria LIFE08 NAT/BG/278 Project. The site was set up in order to guarantee all our vultures are well-fed and happy. It is surrounded by an electric fence in order to prevent the entrance of foxes, jackals and domestic dogs. The food we secure for the vultures consists of dead domestic animals, granted to our team by the local farmers and cattle-breeders.

The only species of vulture which feeds on bones - the Bearded Vulture - the symbol of Bulgarian nature conservation - has gone extinct a long time ago. As good as nurses Griffon Vultures are, they leave bones and pieces of skin and fur behind.

That is why on March 23d 2013 a united team of volunteers from Plovdiv, Stara Zagora, Kurdzhali and even France, gathered to clean the supplementary feeding site and the aviary of Central Balkan. All remains of the vulture feasts were collected and buried in a specially designed hole.
Interns of the Wildlife Rescue Centre at Green Balkans - Stara Zagora from the Professional High-school of Veterinary Medicine “I. P. Pavlov” also joined the brigade.

Our team was greeted by five Griffon Vultures, earlier released by the Green Balkans team. Among them was a wild, non-tagged vulture which obviously came to visit our birds in Central Balkan.

We are grateful to all volunteers and friends of vultures, who did not get scared by the smiling skulls and bones and helped us clean the home of our vultures!

For more information, please contact:
Elena Kmetova - project manager - + 359 885 219 557; ekmetova@greenbalkans.org