Overall, the weather was really, really hot and very dry ( 32-39 C ), so my expectations were not too big! There were a couple of light showers of rain, but it didn’t make much difference after the long months of drought!
Pravetz
I’m going to start with my hometown. It is situated in a valley in the western Stara Planina mountains. No big rivers here, but some dams, canals and shady cool forest streams. First I went to check my usual spots and found the usual animals there – Anguis fragilis, Rana dalmatina , Pelophylax ridibundus , Emys orbicularis and Bufo bufo. In one of the streams, to my surprise I found a number of juvenile and one huge female Rana temporaria! It may not sound like much of a discovery for you western guys, but this frog is not that widely distributed in Bulgaria and it was the first time I find it in my hometown! Usually it is found between 1000 and 2000 m asl here, and I’ve read that sometimes it comes down to about 400 m asl to breed! Well, the place I found it at is around 450 m asl and it was way out of their breeding season! So, they either live at this altitude throughout the whole year or they are their because of the shade and moisture! Another strange thing about this find was that in this particular stream, only R.temporaria were present, whilst in other very similar streams ( 1 km away , only ) only R.dalmatina were present! The conditions in all the streams look the same, so what could cost that division?
Bezhanovo
Another place we often visit when in Bulgaria, is my girlfriend’s villa, on the shore of the river Vit, in the Danube Valley. The weather was really hot, so we limited our search around the river where there is moisture and shade from the trees, as oppose to the heat and drought of the plains further aside. The most common species here was Pelophylax ridibundus (not a surprise) followed by Lacerta viridis, but there were also a considerable number of Natrix tessellata, a bit less Natrix natrix and some Podarcis muralis and Rana dalmatina.