But work by a handful of naturalists in Kenya offers clues about the consequences of their decline.Ī paper published earlier this year found that, over the last 40 years, vulture numbers have fallen by 88 per cent in Kenya, Some birds of prey – like the augur buzzard and long-crested eagle – also plummeted by more than 90 per cent. “If you get rid of a hugely important component of an ecosystem – like a vulture which hoovers up dead meat – diseases can proliferate because they're not being kept in check,” Mr Kapila said.īecause of the centuries of bad press, experts say that African vultures have never been a well-funded research area like elephants or rhinos. “If you screw up natural equilibriums that have developed over tens of millions of years, you can get what we call a trophic cascade effect,” he added, reaching up and giving Yusef, a seven-year-old Rüppell's vulture with a broken wing, a helping hand down from the ledge. We still don't know nearly enough about what all this means. “Vultures and other medium to large raptor species are probably the most threatened group of vertebrates on the planet,” said Shiv Kapila, director of the Naivasha Raptor Centre, 60 miles from the Kenyan capital. Seven out of eleven of the species found in Africa are now on the verge of extinction. In the 1990s, vulture populations on the Indian subcontinent plummeted by about 99 per cent. Certain species may even help disinfect the ground near carcasses with their highly acidic excrement.īut now, many vultures and other raptor species are diving beak first into the abyss. Some researchers believe vultures indirectly keep rabies infections in check by depriving rats and feral dogs of bountiful food. The birds’ digestive systems are thought to be tough enough to stop bacterial colonies of the plague, anthrax and botulism in their tracks. Maggots and bacteria are the only things more effective at disposing of dead meat. A flock of vultures can wipe a dead antelope clean in about 20 minutes, stopping the carcass from turning into a toxic soup leaking into water sources. If the lion is the king of the savannah, the vulture is the hardworking, unsung grounds keeper. But in reality, the birds serve us in ways that we are only just beginning to understand – helping to keep ecosystems and pathogens in check. “Where the corpse is, vultures will gather,” Jesus is quoted as saying in Matthew 24. A catastrophic decline of vulture populations in Africa and Asia is causing alarm among researchers, who fear that a “cascade” effect could lead to the spread of deadly old and new diseases, including plague, anthrax, and rabies.įor thousands of years, the birds have been synonymous with death and gluttony.
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