{"id":34672,"date":"2025-10-27T09:59:40","date_gmt":"2025-10-27T07:59:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/?p=34672"},"modified":"2025-10-27T09:59:40","modified_gmt":"2025-10-27T07:59:40","slug":"record-number-of-white-headed-ducks-recorded-in-bulgaria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/record-number-of-white-headed-ducks-recorded-in-bulgaria\/","title":{"rendered":"Record Number of White-headed Ducks Recorded in Bulgaria"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Photo: \u00a9 Daniel Jara<\/em><\/p>\n<p>On <strong data-start=\"130\" data-end=\"150\">October 25, 2025<\/strong>, during the regular monitoring of the <strong data-start=\"189\" data-end=\"205\">Burgas Lakes<\/strong>, BSPB expert <strong data-start=\"219\" data-end=\"240\">Vladimir Mladenov<\/strong> recorded a <strong data-start=\"252\" data-end=\"275\">new national record<\/strong> of <strong data-start=\"279\" data-end=\"300\">4,603 individuals<\/strong> of the <strong data-start=\"308\" data-end=\"349\">globally endangered White-headed Duck<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_34668\" style=\"width: 753px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-34668\" class=\"wp-image-34668 lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/bspb.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/viber_image_2025-10-27_08-51-28-499-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"743\" height=\"557\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 743px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 743\/557;\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-34668\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><em>Photo: \u00a9 Vladimir Mladenov \/ BSPB<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n<p data-start=\"354\" data-end=\"844\">The White-headed Duck is a <strong data-start=\"381\" data-end=\"412\">globally threatened species<\/strong> with a rapidly declining population. Worldwide, the number of mature individuals is estimated at <strong data-start=\"510\" data-end=\"537\">between 5,300 and 8,700<\/strong>, while the <strong data-start=\"549\" data-end=\"582\">European wintering population<\/strong> is estimated at <strong data-start=\"599\" data-end=\"630\">7,500 to 15,900 individuals<\/strong>. In Bulgaria, the species is <strong data-start=\"660\" data-end=\"697\">only a migrant and <\/strong><strong>a <\/strong><strong>wintering bird<\/strong>. The current observation at <strong data-start=\"726\" data-end=\"748\">Lake Burgas (Vaya)<\/strong> theoretically represents <strong data-start=\"774\" data-end=\"797\">between 29% and 61%<\/strong> of the entire European wintering population.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"846\" data-end=\"1073\">Lake Burgas is the <strong data-start=\"865\" data-end=\"888\">main wintering site<\/strong> for the species in Bulgaria and one of the <strong data-start=\"932\" data-end=\"966\">most important sites in Europe<\/strong>. This new record once again confirms its international significance for the conservation of the species.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_34670\" style=\"width: 758px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-34670\" class=\"wp-image-34670 lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/bspb.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/viber_image_2025-10-27_08-51-28-652-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"748\" height=\"561\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 748px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 748\/561;\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-34670\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><em>Photo: \u00a9 Vladimir Mladenov \/ BSPB<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n<p data-start=\"1075\" data-end=\"1489\">During the last decade, the number of wintering White-headed Ducks in Burgas had dropped to <strong data-start=\"1167\" data-end=\"1192\">critically low levels<\/strong> \u2014 just a few hundred individuals \u2014 a trend observed across the species\u2019 entire range. However, in recent winters, this trend has <strong data-start=\"1322\" data-end=\"1347\">reversed dramatically<\/strong>, and the population in Bulgaria has increased sharply. Last autumn, at the same time, another <strong data-start=\"1442\" data-end=\"1473\">record of 4,163 individuals<\/strong> was reported.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"1491\" data-end=\"1678\" data-is-last-node=\"\" data-is-only-node=\"\">The <strong data-start=\"1495\" data-end=\"1518\">origin of the birds<\/strong> and the reasons behind this <strong data-start=\"1547\" data-end=\"1584\">sudden positive change in numbers<\/strong> remain unclear, but the finding offers a glimmer of hope for the future of this rare species.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Photo: \u00a9 Daniel Jara On October 25, 2025, during the regular monitoring of the Burgas Lakes, BSPB expert Vladimir Mladenov recorded a new national record of 4,603 individuals of the globally endangered White-headed Duck. The White-headed Duck is a globally threatened species with a rapidly declining population. Worldwide, the number of mature individuals is estimated [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":34666,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[165],"tags":[],"dipi_cpt_category":[],"class_list":["post-34672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34672\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34672"},{"taxonomy":"dipi_cpt_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bspb.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/dipi_cpt_category?post=34672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}