The experts do not yet know the cause of the unprecedented case.

An unusual incident happened in the past month. On September 22, an injured and weakened young white stork was found in Kaszó, Somogy. Activists of the Bütyök Animal Shelter and Animal Protection Association successfully captured the bird and treated its wounds, while it turned out that this stork did not stay at home, but was ringed in Bulgaria - it can be read on the website of the Multi-Colored Regions, where András Márton, the BirdMania Bird Park and Nature Conservation Center in Dömös his manager told him about what happened.

After contacting the Bulgarian bird rescuers, it turned out that the young stork was born this year in Burgas, and was found in July after falling out of the nest, and then brought to the rescue center, where it was raised.

After that, on September 13, he was released to head towards Africa with the other storks, where they will spend the winter. However, instead of Africa, this stork headed roughly north-west, which is how it ended up in Hungary. Since this stork hatched in a stork's nest in Burgas, it cannot be ruled out that it inherited it from its parents (it cannot belong to a family of westward migrants, i.e. those migrating towards Gibraltar).

The white stork is a long-distance migratory bird species, leaving Europe by bypassing the Mediterranean Sea. Western European specimens cross at Gibraltar and move on to their wintering grounds in West Africa. In contrast, the nesting white storks of Central and Eastern Europe, including the Carpathian Basin, leave the continent in the Bosphorus region, then reach Africa and continue south. Some of the birds make a detour to the Lake Chad region before reaching the wintering grounds found in Central and South Africa.

According to the experts, this is a unique case, they have never seen anything like it before, and they don't even know the reason.

It is also strange that during his journey he could meet storks flying in the opposite direction, but the eccentric stork continued his journey anyway. The stork is seen as an adventurer of discovery, hence the name Columbus.

The Bulgarian stork was transported to the BirdMania Bird Park and Nature Conservation Center, where his recovery is progressing well. According to the plans, it will be released next year, and it will also be given a beacon to find out whether it will go east or west for the winter next time.

Featured Image: Pixabay