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How these fascinating birds keep places clean and reduce disease—and why they deserve a following
Date:
October 31, 2024
Author:
Danielle Brigida
Social media influencers carefully curate their feeds, grow their followers, and share their expert tips. But what if we told you vultures, in their own way, are nature’s influencers—curating cleaner ecosystems, building their networks, and teaching us how to improve conservation practices? Vultures are nature’s dedicated waste management specialists; they help with nutrient cycling and even reduce the spread of disease. In the US, we have turkey vultures, black vultures, and endangered California condors, but worldwide we’re currently sharing the planet with 23 vulture species. Vultures typically have bald heads and excellent vision, and some, like the turkey vulture, even have a keen sense of smell. They’re fascinating birds and we’d like to share a few ways we consider vultures to be nature’s influencers:
1. Vultures help with the overall aesthetic and vibe of an ecosystem.
Vultures and their eating habits keep places more sanitary. They eat carrion, feeding on recently deceased animals. By quickly consuming meat and bone fragments before they rot, vultures help prevent the growth of dangerous pathogens. Often if a large animal dies at night, vultures and other scavengers will clean it up as an early morning feast. African vultures for example consume 70% of all dead hoofed mammals. Their stomachs even have the pH of battery acid, which allows them to sterilize the carcass and its immediate surroundings of bacteria that cause botulism and anthrax. In places where vultures no longer live, carcasses can take up to four times as long to decompose, increasing the opportunity for disease transmission. Many people don’t realize that vultures influence human health. In India, for example, hundreds of thousands of human deaths are said to be traced back to the collapse of the vulture population. Other scavengers just don’t have suitable disposal methods, meaning that diseases still spread. Declines in vulture populations are happening across the globe—an alarming development for all of us.
The vultures were collared with support from Birdlife Zimbabwe and Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority.
2. Vultures have followers.
WWF recently invested in tracking white-backed vulture movements. Within their range in Africa, white-backed vultures play a pivotal role in their ecosystem including helping to detect animals killed illegally by poachers. But there is still a lot to learn about their behavior, too! This knowledge gap inspired WWF-Zimbabwe and its partners, Birdlife Zimbabwe and Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority, to start collaring and tracking them, similarly to how they followed elephants and lions in Chizarira National Park. The information from collaring vultures will inform wildlife movement and distribution in the Zimbabwe portion of the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA). Collaring vultures allows researchers to do a few different and important things:
Track movement patterns and foraging habits: By tracking foraging behaviors like migratory routes and habitat use, researchers can improve conservation strategies. Vultures travel long distances at low energy cost, a skill they need to find food. Tagging other animals such as zebras has allowed us to better understand incredible, cross-continental movements, and we are interested to see how vultures play into this activity.
Connect vultures with mammal movements: Vulture movements often align with those of large mammals. Tracking them will provide more insight into how other wildlife in the area interact with the landscape.
Monitor environmental health and poaching activities: Changes in vulture populations and behavior signal shifts in the ecosystem, possibly due to human activities or climate change. Tagged vultures have also been used as sentinels for poaching activities and have even lead authorities to discover incidents where animals are poisoned.
In Africa, the decline of vulture populations highlights the urgency of such conservation efforts. Understanding these birds can help us ensure the health of the ecosystems they support.
3. Vultures are scavenger role models.
Vultures are considered obligate scavengers, meaning they’ve evolved alongside predators to eat their leftovers. They’re committed to the scavenger lifestyle. Feeding sites can be busy, hectic places, and often include multiple vultures and sometimes even families gathering together. In fact, a collective group of feeding vultures even has a name–a 'wake' or if they’re resting, a ‘committee.’ Many vulture species are thought to work as a team to scavenge by using another animal’s behavior as their guide. They may join the feasting when there are still predators present or they may wait their turn until after the predators leave the scene.
4. Vultures are endlessly fascinating.
Take a minute to learn more about any of the vulture species on this planet—we know you won’t regret it. Take the bearded vulture! Aside from not being bare-headed like most other vultures, bearded vultures are found in remote mountainsides and perched on cliffs across Asia, Africa, and Europe. Scientists have documented some fascinating “make-up” applications from these vultures. Adult bearded vultures are known for their striking appearance, especially their bright rust-colored feathers. Interestingly, this color comes from them deliberately rubbing themselves with iron-rich soil or mud, as their natural feathers are white. Aside from this “beauty influencer” behavior, you’ll also be impressed to learn that their diet is made up almost entirely of bones. Nothing says unique like a bone-eating make-up artist. The more we learn about vultures, the more awe there is to uncover.
5. Vultures are getting more recognition of their importance.
Recently, vultures have gotten shout-outs in multiple WWF reports and are gaining the recognition they deserve worldwide. WWF’s 2024 Living Planet Report, Nature’s Technicians Report, and One Health Reportall mention vultures and the important ecosystem services they perform. As our appreciation grows, we hope to continue learning and making space for these incredible birds on the landscape.
When we protect and respect vultures, we support the rich tapestry of life—and some of nature’s coolest influencers.
