Bringing the Cinereous Vulture Back to Bulgaria's Mountains

The Cinereous (Eurasian black) vulture vanished as a breeding species from Bulgaria decades ago, with the last confirmed nesting recorded in 1993 in the Eastern Rhodopes. Since 2018, Green Balkans has worked with the Vulture Conservation Foundation, the Fund for Wild Flora and Fauna, and Spanish partners to release captive-bred and rescued cinereous vultures into the Balkan Mountains and Eastern Rhodopes under the Vultures Back to LIFE programme, while translocating wild ungulates to rebuild the birds' natural prey base. More than 100 vultures have been released to date, and the reintroduced population bred successfully for the first time in over three decades. The 2025 breeding season set a new record, with eight cinereous vulture chicks hatched across nesting pairs split between the Vratsa Balkan and Kotel Balkan colonies.