Beyond the ‘Ugly’

“I know we need vultures, but, wow, they’re just so ugly!” a jogger told me one morning while I was watching a group of turkey vultures in a park. She stopped just long enough to make this statement, and then kept running.

Vultures, it seems, often evoke a reaction in people. During the many hours I’ve spent observing these birds, dozens of people have approached me to voice their opinion. A few have expressed admiration. Most, however, convey that they’re fine with vultures dining out there on dead animals, but the key is that vultures remain “out there.” Up close, these large birds with bald heads and “gross” eating habits tend to make people uneasy.

In Missouri we have two species of vultures — turkey vultures and black vultures. Turkey vultures are found throughout the state from March through October but only in southern portions in winter. Black vultures are found mainly in southern Missouri, but their range is expanding northward.

Most often you will see vultures soaring high above you or eating roadkill. But as these species are adapting well to life among humans, you may also find them roosting in your neighborhood, perching on a local billboard, or picking through trash in a dumpster. Getting to know more about them — not just how they eat but how they live their day-to-day lives — may alleviate your discomfort and help you see beyond the “ugly.”

Vulture Cam

Although vultures are dedicated parents, neither of our two vulture species build nests. They lay their eggs on a bare surface inside hollow trees and caves, next to logs, under bushes, or under limestone overhangs. They also nest in human-built structures.

Every year, MDC Natural History Biologist Rhonda Rimer checks old barns and other buildings for barn owl nests, but sometimes she finds vultures, too.

“It’s fascinating how many species one crummy old structure can support,” she says. “I’ve found big brown bat roosts and barn owls on a higher level, and turkey vultures or black vultures nesting under the floorboards or in the crawl space.”

Over years of vulture nest encounters, Rimer has grown more and more interested in vultures. Turkey vultures nesting in the barn of Chuck Hird in Marshall, Missouri, sparked his interest in vultures as well. The vultures began nesting in the barn’s loft in 2009 and kept returning each year. When Hird contacted the Raptor Resource Project (based in Decorah, Iowa) about the nest, the staff jumped at the chance to add a turkey vulture nest cam to their existing cams on eagles, falcons, and other raptors. Turkey vultures usually nest in secluded places, so a nest where electricity could be brought in to run a livestreaming camera was a grand opportunity. In 2012, the vultures in Hird’s barn became the first nesting turkey vultures to ever be livestreamed. People in countries around the world began watching them.

“It’s impressive to me how much both parents take part in raising the chicks,” Hird says. Both parents incubate the eggs and feed the young after they hatch. Turkey vultures usually lay eggs from early April through early May. (Black vultures lay eggs a month earlier.) Two eggs are the norm. They hatch in about a month.

For the first week after hatch, the parents take turns brooding the chicks to keep them warm, but once the nestlings can regulate their own body heat, both parents are gone most of the time, searching for food, returning for brief intervals to regurgitate a meal into the chicks’ mouths.

Hird and his wife, Marty, say that if the nest cam is on and they’re in another room, they still know when there’s been a feeding. “You’ll hear the formidable squawking and carrying on,” says Hird, “as they [the chicks] almost attack whatever parent has the food.”

Vultures lack the vocal structure required to sing or make typical bird calls; they can only grunt and hiss.

“The sound that comes out of the young ones’ mouths is very scary,” says Rimer. “They spread their wings open and try to look so menacing, but at the same time they’re just fluffy, little powder puffs.”

The chicks gradually lose their fluffy down as feathers grow in. Over time, the youngsters begin to explore their surroundings. As they approach full size, they practice opening their wings and jump around while flapping. In just over two months, they are ready to leave the nest and learn the art of soaring.

Riding on Air Currents

“Because their food source is unpredictable and they may spend hours searching for a carcass,” MDC State Ornithologist Kristen Heath-Acre explains, “vultures are designed to cover lots of ground and do so in a way that conserves energy. Their bodies are light compared to how long their wings are, and aerodynamically that means they don’t have to flap much.”

Flapping burns a lot of energy, so vultures soar. To gain altitude, vultures float on thermal updrafts (rising columns of warm air) that carry them skyward. They circle upwards until they reach a good height, then they glide off in their chosen direction, gradually losing altitude, but then they find another updraft and repeat the process.

Although both species rely on soaring, there are differences in how they fly.

“Black vultures have a heavier wing load and so they flap more than turkey vultures,” says Heath-Acre. “Turkey vultures don’t flap very often, and they tilt back and forth when they soar.”

Both species weigh an average of 4 pounds, but while black vultures have a 5-foot wingspan, turkey vultures’ wings span 6 feet. With a lighter wing load, turkey vultures can travel on weaker air currents than black vultures can.

Adult turkey vulture

Identifying features:

• Red head and white beak
• Lower half of wing is silvery white when viewed from below

Juvenile turkey vulture

• Gray head

Adult black vulture

Identifying features:

• Gray to blackish head
• White patches at the end of wings

Juvenile black vulture

• Darker/blackish head

Vultures Slow the Spread of Diseases

Ecologically speaking, the job of vultures is scavenging (eating dead animals). While many animals scavenge some of the time (for example, coyotes, eagles, raccoons, opossums, and bears), only vultures are equipped to scavenge full time. Being a great scavenger may not sound like something to brag about, but the scavenging role of vultures makes a huge contribution to our ecosystem.

Vultures help curb the spread of diseases by removing carcasses swiftly. Because vultures travel by air, they can cover more ground and find carrion faster than mammalian scavengers, which move on foot and must navigate around bushes, hills, and other obstacles.

“Once vultures locate a carcass, they gather in large numbers and consume it quickly,” MDC Wildlife Health Program Supervisor Deb Hudman explains. “This rapid removal of carcasses prevents the buildup of rotting flesh, which can harbor bacteria, parasites, and other disease-causing organisms.”

“Vultures also have a highly efficient microbiome,” she says. The bacteria and other microbes that live on a vulture’s face and in its stomach allow it to safely consume many pathogens that would sicken other animals.

So, when a vulture is the first to find a carcass, diseases the dead animal may carry (such as distemper, tularemia, and rabies) are taken out of the environment. However, if a raccoon, opossum, or your dog were to eat that same carcass, they could get sick and potentially spread the disease to others. By outcompeting other scavengers, vultures stop this disease cycle, protecting not only wild animals, but also pets, livestock, and humans, because many wildlife diseases can cross over to us.

Learn more about vultures’ adaptations for scavenging online at short.mdc.mo.gov/4eC.

Human-Vulture Conflict

Sometimes vultures can cause problems for people. Both species may roost in large numbers in trees in a yard or neighborhood. During migration, they likely will stay for only a week or two, but if they use your neighborhood as a summer or winter roost, the accumulation of droppings can get smelly. Likewise, if they perch regularly on cell phone towers, the buildup of feces can be problematic for technicians who climb the towers. Black vultures sometimes cause property damage by tearing windshield wipers on cars, awnings and seat covers on boats, or shingles on rooftops. Black vultures are also known to occasionally prey on newborn livestock.

“We’ll work with landowners to prevent as much conflict as possible,” says MDC Wildlife Management Coordinator Alan Leary. Because the black vulture population is increasing, agencies in Missouri are developing “an integrated wildlife damage management approach that involves deterrence, harassment, possibly some lethal control, and modification of human behavior,” he says.

Vultures are federally protected, and it is illegal to harm or kill them without a permit. However, there are things you can do to make your property less inviting to them. For information on how to deter vultures or how to get a depredation permit, contact your local MDC wildlife damage biologist.

Additional information is available on the MU Black Vulture Project (short.mdc.mo.gov/4ey) or USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service Operational Activities: Vultures (short.mdc.mo.gov/4uT) websites.

Food and Community

Vultures’ daily lives revolve around searching for food and gathering each evening at a communal roost. Black vultures and turkey vultures both roost in groups ranging from a few individuals to hundreds. In areas where the species overlap, the two may roost together.

On a typical day, vultures leave their roost trees around sunrise and move to an open spot nearby where they can warm up in the sun. Often, they’ll perch in dead trees with no leaves, but the shore of a lake, the sunny side of a dam, top of a billboard, or cell phone tower also make great spots for sunning. They then spend the next one to three hours preening their feathers as they wait for the sun’s rays to heat the ground and create the updrafts they need to head out and search for food.

Vultures don’t reach breeding age until they are 6 or 7 years old, so during the nesting season, nonbreeding vultures are what you’ll find at roosting sites. But after the young have fledged, parents and their offspring begin joining the roosts. In Missouri, this typically happens in July for black vultures and August for turkey vultures.

Vulture Behavior

Although both species will roost in large numbers, black vultures are considered more social, with long-lasting family bonds. Turkey vulture families haven’t been studied much, but it appears that after the young fledge, parents care for them for only a few weeks. Black vultures, however, feed their young for up to six months after fledging. Black vultures also help their offspring feed at crowded carcasses by pushing unrelated vultures away.

Turkey vultures have a superior sense of smell, which helps them find carrion more quickly. Black vultures seem to know this and fly higher in the sky, watching turkey vultures as they forage. When a turkey vulture lands, the black vultures follow it to the carcass. Because black vultures feed in larger groups, they usually outnumber the turkey vultures and takeover the meal. This may be why turkey vultures tend to feed on smaller carrion — they can eat it quickly before black vultures, an eagle, or other large predator takes it away.

Vultures and People

Not all animals adapt well to living alongside humans, but black and turkey vultures have. The human-developed landscape offers many features they need as more remote habitat disappears. Not only do our old buildings provide nesting sites, but roofs and cell phone towers make good perching areas, and dams and fragmented forest edges create updrafts when wind hits them. And, of course, our cars and roadways offer a never-ending source of carrion.

While vultures sometimes damage property, the overall effect of having them around is beneficial. By eating carrion, vultures slow the spread of diseases and help regulate populations of mammalian scavengers.

“About 60 percent of the world’s vultures are listed as endangered or threatened. We’re really lucky that our two species are doing very well,” says Rimer.

In India, three vulture species declined by 96 to 99 percent in the 1990s. Vultures had been key in reducing the spread of rabies and other diseases that affect both humans and animals. The steep decline in the vulture population led to an increase in these diseases, costing the Indian government billions of dollars in healthcare. Although the cause of the decline has been identified and changes are underway — including the release of captive-reared vultures — restoring the population takes time. Until the numbers rebound, the people of India are keenly aware of this loss.

Vulture Appreciation

The loss of vultures in several parts of the world prompted conservationists globally to launch International Vulture Awareness Day (IVAD) in 2009. Through IVAD events and other education campaigns, people at large are beginning to appreciate the importance of vultures. More researchers are also studying vultures, including our two species. People who work with vultures often report that the more they learn about vultures, the more they like them.

Ivan Vining has volunteered at the Raptor Rehabilitation Project in Columbia, Missouri, for six years, caring for injured birds of prey. He’s worked with owls, hawks, falcons, and eagles, but vultures are by far his favorite.

“Vultures are awesome!” Vining says. “They are so efficient at doing their job… and integral to keeping our environment clean.”