Local zoo in Bulgaria saves elderly storks from the coming winter

The Zoo’s Director Hristian Hristov said that some of the birds are too old to fly to Africa

As autumn draws near, nights are getting longer, trees are getting browner and mornings are getting colder. The skies near the western Black Sea coast are filled with countless birds from all across Europe, coming to the Province of Dobrich and the wetlands near the Danube Delta, where they will prepare to make the difficult journey down south.

However, some birds will be left behind, as they are too old to fly to Africa for the winter. The Zoo Centre Dobrich in Bulgaria is stepping up to help them. Today, it reported that it recently rescued four elderly storks and relocated them to the facility grounds near the city of Dobrich.

You know storks are in dire straits when they eat salami

According to Hristian Hristov, the director of the facility, one of the storks suffered an electrical shock and is partially paralysed, while the other three are just too old to fly.

He described the rescue operation as quite difficult because, despite the fact that the storks cannot fly, they can run tens of meters before the trained staff are able to catch them.

The veterinary office in the Zoo Centre is expecting two more storks today, after a similar operation in two nearby villages. The locals notified the Zoo about two storks, explaining that they were feeding them with salami and frankfurters. Director Hristov commented that the storks must be in dire straits if they were accepting salami as food.

The Zoo Centre Dobrich is a unique facility for Bulgaria, as well as in Eastern Europe as a whole. It occupies 160 acres of land, surrounded by a rich, biodiverse 40-year-old forest, and is home to 350 animals of 70 species.

Since 2003, there has been a portion of the park where animals, typical to the European biosphere, roam freely and visitors can interact with them without any fences or walls.