by Arnau Bonan Barfull, David Giralt Jonama, Santiago Guallar and Oriol Soler Ferrer
INTRODUCTION
This is the birdwatching trip report of a trip done in Poland by four Catalan birdwatchers, from the 15th until the 28th of August of 1999.
For preparing the trip, we used the book "Where to watch birds in Eastern Europe", by Gerard Gorman. The book has good drawings of the sites and good explanations, but does not give much phenologic information, so perhaps in another time of the year is more useful, but we found that some species where not present, or we could not found them where the book says. A friend of us was in Poland in June 1998, and he also helped us recommending places.
We flew from Barcelona to Cracow. We rent a car to National company at the airport. We had a problem with the car, and they did not explain well what we had to pay and when-why, so we are not happy with that company, but we know that more or less all the renting companies does the same.
We slept in a tent, in camping sites or free camping, depending on the site. In Poland, it was quite complicated to eat for reasonable prices outside of big cities.
It took more time that we expected to drive from one place to the other, as usually the roads are just one way, so we did not drove too many kms, but we spend a lot of time in the car.
ABSTRACT
Here follows a brief summary of the report.
August 15: day in Cracow, we drove to Zakopane, where we arrived at night.
August 16: all day birdwatching at the Tatra National Park.
Most interesting species: Great Spotted Woodpecker, Eurasian Treecreeper, Wood Warbler.
August 17: We drove to Bieszczady, where we arrived in the afternoon.
Most interesting species: Black Stork, Lesser Spotted Eagle, Great Spotted Woodpecker, Eurasian Treecreeper, Red-breasted Flycatcher, Great Grey Shrike, Nutcracker.
August 18: all day in Bieszczady.
Most interesting species: Black Stork, Golden Eagle, Pigmy Owl, Great Spotted Woodpecker, White-backed Woodpecker, River Warbler, Wood Warbler, Red-breasted Flycatcher, Nutcracker.
August 19: Most of the day in Bieszczady, in the afternoon we drove to Bialowieska.
Most interesting species: Black Stork, Lesser Spotted Eagle, Wryneck, Great Spotted Woodpecker, White-backed Woodpecker, Black Woodpecker, Lesser Whitethroat, Wood Warbler, Red-breasted Flycatcher, Nutcracker.
August 20: Most of the day in the car, we arrived at Bialowieska in the afternoon.
Most interesting species: Lesser Spotted Eagle, Montagu´s, Hen and Marsh Harrier, Pigmy Owl, Wood Warbler.
August 21: All day birdwatching in Bialowieska.
Most interesting species: Hen Harrier, Lesser Spotted Eagle, Hazel Grouse, Grey-headed Woodpecker, Lesser, Middle and Great Spotted Woodpecker, Black Woodpecker, Sedge Warbler, Lesser Whitethroat, Nutcracker.
August 22: All day birdwatching in Bialowieska.
Most interesting species: Black Woodpecker, Sedge Warbler, Wood Warbler, Lesser Whitethroat, Red-breasted Flycatcher, Eurasian Treecreeper, Nutcracker
August 23: In the morning we stayed in Bialowieska, at midday we went to Byalistok fish-ponds, and in the afternoon we drove to Biebrza marshes.
Most interesting species: Red-necked Grebe, Slavonian Grebe, Osprey, Black Tern, Wryneck, Sedge Warbler, Great Reed Warbler, Wood Warbler, Lesser Whitethroat, Red-breasted Flycatcher, Penduline Tit.
August 24: In the morning we stayed in the Southern Basin, and in the afternoon we went to the Central Basin of the marshes.
Most interesting species: Golden Plover, Great Spotted Woodpecker, Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, Black Woodpecker, Great Grey Shrike.
August 25: In the morning we stayed in the Central Basin, in the afternoon we drove to Gdansk, and at sunset we went to Swibno.
Most interesting species: Lesser Spotted Eagle, Great Grey Shrike.
August 26: In the morning we went to Swibno, and in the afternoon we stayed in Rewa.
Most interesting species: Black-throated Diver, Mute Swan, Scaup, Common Goldeneye, Goosander, Red-breasted Merganser, White-tailed Eagle, Sanderling, Knot, Grey Plover, Turnstone, Little Gull, Common Gull, Great Black-backed Gull, Caspian Tern, Black Tern, Lesser Whitethroat, Sedge Warbler, Red-breasted Flycatcher.
August 27: we stayed in Rewa until 1pm, when we went to eat, we packed everything and we drove to Cracow.
Most interesting species: Black-throated Diver, Mute Swan, Pintail, Scaup, Common Goldeneye, Red-breasted Merganser, Great Black-backed Gull, Great Spotted Woodpecker, Wood Warbler, Penduline Tit, Eurasian Treecreeper.
August 28: we arrived to Cracow and we flew to Barcelona.
