Birds of the Danube Delta and Dobrogea
Species notes from our checklist: identification, habitat, behaviour, and where and when we see each bird.
Species by species
The birds, in checklist order
The notes follow the order of our checklist of Dobrogea and the Danube Delta. We add new species through the year.
6 min read
Red-breasted Goose (Branta ruficollis)
Most of the world population spends the winter on the western shore of the Black Sea, and about a third of it in Dobrogea....
5 min read
Grey Partridge (Perdix perdix)
A plump farmland bird of the Dobrogea steppe that freezes in the grass and bursts into flight at your feet
5 min read
Greater Flamingo (Phoenicopterus roseus)
Once only a rare visitor, the flamingo now appears more and more often in the salty lagoons of the Danube Delta and Dobrogea.
5 min read
Little Grebe (Tachybaptus ruficollis)
The smallest grebe in Europe: a round little diver that comes to the Danube Delta in numbers for the winter.
4 min read
Red-necked Grebe (Podiceps grisegena)
A brick red neck, pale grey cheeks and a dagger bill with a yellow base: a shy breeding grebe of the quiet lakes of...
4 min read
Black-necked Grebe (Podiceps nigricollis)
Golden fans behind the eyes and red eyes: in spring, one of the most elegant water birds of the Danube Delta lakes.
4 min read
Whiskered Tern (Chlidonias hybrida)
The tern of the water lilies: it nests on floating leaves and hunts low over the lakes of the Danube Delta all summer.
4 min read
White-winged Tern (Chlidonias leucopterus)
Jet black body and white wings in spring: the most striking of the marsh terns over the lakes of the Danube Delta.
5 min read
Pallas’s Gull (Ichthyaetus ichthyaetus)
The largest black headed gull in the world, nesting on the islands of the Danube Delta coast since 2009.
5 min read
Glossy Ibis (Plegadis falcinellus)
Dark brown in the shade, green and bronze in the sun: the only ibis that breeds widely in Europe, and the Danube Delta is...
4 min read
Little Bittern (Botaurus minutus)
The smallest heron of the Danube Delta, so well hidden in the reeds that most visitors only see it flying low over the channel.
4 min read
Squacco Heron (Ardeola ralloides)
A sandy heron that turns white the moment it takes off. Easy to see from the boat in summer, along the channels.
5 min read
Purple Heron (Ardea purpurea)
The heron of the reed beds: once the most common heron of the Danube Delta, now second to the Grey Heron, and the reason...
4 min read
Grey Heron (Ardea cinerea)
The largest heron in Europe and the most common in the Danube Delta today, a bird the dredged canals and their willows helped to...
4 min read
European Roller (Coracias garrulus)
Turquoise wings and a cinnamon back on a dry branch over the steppe: the bird our photographers come to Dobrogea for in June.
4 min read
Eurasian Penduline Tit (Remiz pendulinus)
A tiny masked bird that weaves a hanging nest like a felt bottle at the tip of a willow branch over the water.
4 min read
Bearded Reedling (Panurus biarmicus)
A small long tailed bird of the reed beds, heard as a ringing “ping” long before it is seen.
4 min read
Isabelline Wheatear (Oenanthe isabellina)
A pale sandy wheatear that sings from the top of a mound and often nests in an old ground squirrel burrow.
3 min read
Spanish Sparrow (Passer hispaniolensis)
A sparrow with a chestnut cap and a black spotted chest that often builds its nest inside a stork’s nest.
More wildlife
The rest of the fauna
Species from our checklist: where and when to see them in the Danube Delta and Dobrogea.
Golden jackals, sousliks, horses and the other mammals you may meet.
Pond turtles and tortoises, green lizards and meadow vipers, and the frogs that fill the spring nights.
From the mass emergence of the long tailed mayfly to the small life of the reeds.
The fish of the Danube Delta and the Black Sea, and the people who live from them.
Birding with us
See them with our birding guides
Biologists and ornithologists who are on the water every day of the year, in open boats at low speed.