Right then. Have been doing a bit of reading about German single-seat fighters modified as recon aircraft and German strategic recon in general from various sources, including the excellent series Auflkarer, Luftwaffe Reconnaissance and Aircraft. Indeed, the Germans used single-seat fighters (news to me) as strategic recon assets, even over the UK; there are recollections of Bf 109s being shot down or crashing through equipment failure, but these were few and far between and not carried out with any consistency. By 1943 enigma decrypts were revealing that the Germans hadn't taken any recent images over London "for years" and it wasn't until the Ar 234 that such a specially modified recon platform became available, and by then they were too few (only two to begin with) to be of real effectiveness, despite the fact they were largely unstoppable. Primary strategic recon aircraft used by the German armed forces were converted twin engined bombers and maritime aircraft, rather than specialised high speed high altitude assets - the Ju 86P nothwithstanding. German intelligence of Britain's military assets during the war was largely based on recon carried out clandestinely during peacetime and indeed the Germans carried out an extensive survey of the UK before the war, but once the shooting started, German recon of the British Isles declined rapidy. By contrast, the British had scant knowledge of German military facilities before the war and in the first few months of the war, but through the efforts of Cotton began to build a bigger picture, to the extent that the PRU became the foremost strategic recon asset of any armed forces in the war in terms of its utilisation.
Both Fw 190s and Bf 109s were modified by the installation of recon cameras in the rear fuselages and used for strategic recon coverage of Wehrmacht areas of action, in typical LW organisation, the units were self conatined, with their own PIs and developers. From what I've read the Fw 190 was primarily operational from France and to a lesser extent the Soviet Union, but Bf 109s were operational in France, North Africa, Italy and the Soviet Union. These aircraft carried out both tactical and strategic recon under the German Operational Aufklarer stategic pre-and post battle recon and Taktische Aufklarer for tactical battle recon.
The biggest problem facing the LW and indeed the Nazis and their disemmination of information gathered was the fractious nature of relations between the different war departments. The German Aufklarer did not enjoy the same autonomy as the RAF PRUs because of this and the information flow was not always outwith the military command structures of the Wehrmacht and LW itself. By contrast the PRUs and RAF Photographic Interpretation Unit had open communication within the British intelligence departments and not only shared the results of photographic sorties but were under instruction from the intel departments on which specific targets to cover. The lack of German intercommunicational flexibility within its armed forces is no secret.
In conclusion German operations with its single-seaters were pretty much in line with what my understandng of German recon was, although I had no knowledge of the strategic use of the single seaters. Nevertheless, they were not same ops carried out by the RAF PRUs in terms of the endurance and coverage of the Reich for intelligence collecting and were more in common with how battlefield reconnaissance was represented within other countries' armed forces. Modifications to the Fw 190s and Bf 109s were the fitting of cameras and external fuel carriage in line with their role, this extended to the removal of radios and weaponry. The German use of strategic recon was primarily inline with the whims of its military operations in terms of its conquests, rather than building a bigger photographic picture of the Allies and their capabilities at home and abroad. By contrast, by the end of the war, both the United States and British recon assests had photographed almost the entire length and breadth of the Reich. So, my statement about the the differences between the British PRU stands to a degree, then.
German use of its strategic recon assets appear to be determined and persistent at best, but inconsistent and lacking over time to be of real strategic value at worst; furthermore, the modified single-seat assets were not used to the same extent that the British PRU aircraft were, nor did they carry out as extensive operations deep into enemy territory as frequently with the same consistency as the British PRUs, as useful as the German assets were, however. This doesn't take away anything from the airmen who flew these ops for the Aufklarer; PR pilots had a hazardous existence and they were subject to the same pressures as their Allied counterparts.
Thanks for the heads-up guys, I learned something valuable today.