Poland July - August 2007, Masuria

During the summer holidays I visited Poland together with my family. The majority of our time in Poland was spent in Masuria. This is a very beautiful area in North Poland, dotted with countless lakes and old growth forests. Although it is not on the "birder radar" and we did not spent much of our time birding, it proved to hold several interesting bird species. We had based ourselves in a nice home-stay in Ruciane-Nida, a small town in the South of the area. All sites mentioned here are easily reached by car, however I do not know how to get there by other means of transport,

Even simply around the town several nice bird species could be observed with ease. The garden of our home-stay held Spotted Nutcracker, Hawfinch, Spotted Flycatcher, Common Redstart, Whinchat, Red-backed Shrike and several species of Woodpecker, including Middle Spotted Woodpecker. Furthermore White Storks seemed to be the most common bird in the village as well as in the entire area.

Middle Spotted Woodpecker (Dendrocopos medius)

Spotted Nutcracker (Nucifraga caryocatactes)

White Stork (Ciconia ciconia)

A visit to the lake Jezioro Mokre, that lies to the east of Ruciane-Nida proved a good site to look at soaring raptors. Several White-tailed Eagles (both adult and sub-adult), some Northern Goshawks, some Western Marsh Harriers and a single Lesser Spotted Eagle were observed here.

Lesser Spotted Eagle (Clanga pomerina)

Subadult White-tailed Eagle (Haliaeetus albicilla)

The small Jezioro Luknajno proved a good spot for marsh bird like Common Crane, Western Marsh Harrier, Savi's, Grasshopper and Marsh Warbler, next to some nice European Golden Orioles, Middle Spotted Woodpeckers and Red Kites. Furthermore a small peninsula on the south shore of the gigantic Jezioro Sniarwy held more Savi's Warblers and Common Cranes, next to some Great Reed Warblers and Eurasian Penduline Tits. The lake itself also held Goosander and Common Goldeneye.

Common Cranes (Grus grus) in flight

In total we observed almost a hundred species in the Masuria area, so even though it is not a classic Polish birding site, I found it surprisingly entertaining, Furthermore it is a very scenic area, so if you are looking for a site to extend your stay in Poland, Look no further! This blog post and other posts concerning my visit to Poland can be downloaded as PDF file here.