An Almost extinct species -the vulture

The news that’s griping the world today is global warming. Its effects are now slowly coming to light. Some things that were just understood by intellectuals now concerns the common man as well. This ecological imbalance is undoubtedly a result of mans self centric activities. When the sea levels are rising at an alarming rate and the agriculture is suffering, it’s now that he feels the heat. A lot of awareness and steps to reduce global warming are now being discussed on a global level. But a lot which is left in the dark is still facing problems. One such thing is the extinction of vultures that play an important role in maintaining the ecosystem and the bio diversity in general.

As we all know vultures are scavenging birds. They feed on dead animals mostly the cattle. But they don’t kill their prey but are born to clean the environment by consuming the dead. These natural cleansers of the ecosystem are facing a grave problem of extinction, a cause of great concern for all of us.

 Extinction of these birds was considered to be the result of their loss of habitat which is partially true. Increasing urbanization has rendered not just vultures but many more species of birds and animals in danger. But a more recent study claims that population of vultures has been drastically abridged, due to poisoning by the anti-inflammatory drug called diclofenac. This drug is present in the pain killers that humans normally use. It is also present in large amounts in pesticides and chemical fertilizers given to plants and crops to increase productivity. Cattle tend to feed on these plants and hence imbibe these pesticides. When humans and cattle die vultures in turn nourish on them. Diclofenac causes renal failure in vultures.

Scientists feel the quantities of pesticides found in carcass may not cause death of cattle but vultures being small framed animals these chemicals lead to disorders in their reproductive organs. Also, Vultures don’t eat a single carcass, they survive on them. So if one Vulture has tasted flesh of 100 different animal corpses in its lifetime, it has absorbed a lot of chemical. These disorders cause thinning of their egg shells which further results in high mortality rates. This is bothersome, because vultures lay just two or three eggs and that too once a year, also a Vulture chick needs at least 3 complete years to develop, which makes them naturally susceptible to immature death. Researchers studying their deteriorating population have found that pesticide residue causes almost a 20 percent thinning in the egg-shells, making them more vulnerable to the elements of nature, premature hatching and also being an easy prey to predatory birds.

 To add to this, a survey has also found out that in India a number of tribes in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Maharashtra eat vulture meat! But what leads to the concern is the fact that villagers view these as scavenging birds as aggressive predators with a tendency to lunge and lift their livestock. Hence detailed entraps are laid out to destroy these vultures, the widespread method being to mix lethal poison in a body which kills these birds instantly.

Dr. Salim Ali in ‘The Book of Indian Birds’ described vultures as God's own incinerators, which cannot be replaced by even the most sophisticated ones. Serving as nature's doorkeepers, these birds dash about, tolerating the most repellent of food, and ridding our ecosystem of young insects and disease-carrying viruses in the process.Hence it’s our duty to help save these birds from going extinct.