Guide
The Kızılırmak delta is among the largest wetlands on the Black Sea coast of Türkiye and one of the best preserved. Beaches, flooded forest, dunes, reed beds, mud flats and marsh all lie together here, and that mixture of habitats is what produces the variety.
For birds the numbers are specific. The delta holds fifteen of the twenty-four bird species under threat of extinction, along with a large part of the other species seen in the country. A hundred and forty species breed here, and the delta lies on the route of more than seven million migrating birds each year.
Several kinds of protection apply, with different boundaries, to conserve the wildlife and its habitats: the area carries natural site status, wildlife development area status and Ramsar status.
In 2016 the delta was added to the UNESCO World Heritage tentative list — a candidacy, not an inscription.
