site.btaBearded Vulture Hatches at Green Balkans Wildlife Rescue Centre in Stara Zagora

The first chick to hatch during the 2025 breeding season at the Green Balkans Wildlife Rescue Centre is a bearded vulture, the rescue centre in Stara Zagora said on Friday. This is the first bearded vulture to have hatched since the start of the Life for the Bearded Vulture project, which aims to restore the species' population in Bulgaria.

The bearded vulture (Gypaetus barbatus) was declared extinct in this country in the 1980s.

The chick hatched after almost two months of incubation. It will be raised by its parents, which is important for its growth and subsequent adaptation to the wild. The chick will remain in the nest for three months, at which age it should be separated from its parents and released into the wild using a special methodology developed by the Vulture Conservation Foundation, the rescue centre noted.

The pair of bearded vultures have been breeding for the tenth consecutive year, and this is their twelfth chick hatched so far. Most of the successfully raised chicks have been released in target areas for the species' recovery in Spain and France.

There is also a second young pair of bearded vultures, which began to mate in 2025, but it is not yet clear whether they will have offspring, the rescue centre added.

The first release of bearded vultures in Bulgaria is due to take place in mid-May.

On Thursday, Stara Zagora Municipality said that two griffon vulture chicks raised by the Stara Zagora Zoo will be released into the wild on February 22.