As Autumn arrived silently into the Carpathian Basin and we didn’t had to wait long to see the first bigger groups of Common Cranes crossing the sky – let’s just say less quietly. 2020 continues to be a strange year as covid19 still with us in full force. But nature photography never stops!
The Crane migration is one of nature’s miracles and one can witness this ‘Crane Festival’ in the Hortobágy National Park each year. In the past years the high count of Cranes were over 150.000 individuals in the National Park, but this year it was a bit ‘weaker’ with the highest count being about 95.000 birds. For more details on Crane numbers and abundance please check the graph on the Hortobágy National Park’s homepage, where they are uploading continuously the sums of the weekly synchronised counts.
Of course visitors will not feel any difference at the largest roosting sites, which usually are giving the best experience.
2020 was a bit different in Crane roosting behaviour – besides many other aspects… – as the birds were staying out in the fields until dark and they only flew into the safe roosting waters in complete darkness, making the show less spectacular than usual, especially for those visiting the classic sites.
However, we were lucky to have an outstanding ‘season of Cranes’ in terms of photography. The Crane Roosting Hide was performing well until mid October and our team was using several mobile hides to always keep the best opportunities in front of our guests. The Drinking Hides were also productive until late September, as it was a long and dry period of the year.
Our One-day-Crane Photography programme was running in the peak season when the Roosting Hide was operating. The roost was followed by the drinking hide in the first half of the season which was exchanged to mobile hides set up on feeding sites and then finished with capturing the Cranes as they were flying to their roosting area most of the time in the beautiful sunset of the Hortobágy. It is now a well-tested daytour and unless the weather is really bad our success rate was superb!
Even a single set-up can produce distinct captures as changing conditions are giving opportunities of taking very different pictures. So some of our guests returned 2-3 times in the short season and had a very different experience each time!
Bird Photography & Birdwatching in the Hortobágy 