The first sign of spring may be Turkey Vultures circling overhead to clean up carcasses killed by speeding cars that they can locate miles away worth their keen sense of smell. The flight of a Turkey Vulture is easy to recognize by its profile of a lazy circle overhead with the purpose to find dead bodies over municipal garbage dumps picked up by weekly collection of highway cleanup crews.
Turkey vultures are very large birds with a 6-foot wingspan spayed out with a very dark color followed by a pale gray trailing edge.
Vultures have suffered from poor public relations since Charles Darwin called them highly disgusting birds habitually tainted by an aura of rotting flesh. They can get away with eating dead, putrid bodies with their bright red bald naked head, as illustrated, which is a survival adaptation to reduce the risk of fowling feathers by contacting germs of deteriorating corpses.
Many avid devoted bird watchers are content to keep their distance, especially when Vultures are feeding their young by regurgitation with carrion into their mouths along with guttural grunts and groans with the effort.
There are two groups of Vultures which today populate the universe, providing an excellent example of convergent evolution while adapting to diverse conditions on several different continents.
Strangely enough, all the old-world Vultures across the pond have absolutely no smelling ability so they can only rely on vision to locate dead bodies. They must then hunt in a low-level visual flight much like our local harrier hawk. They must use their legs and feet to grasp prey-like birds and small mammals, a very specialized use of a Vulture’s body to survive.
New-world Vultures have survived and increased their numbers by the ability to locate the next meal with their noses and have been joined by another Vulture species called the Black (headed) Vulture. The Black (headed) Vulture since the mid-19th century has expanded its range from southern states up into New England coastal states on the eastern seaboard. They have recently been identified on Buzzards Bay. That there is room for another new world species has been encouraged by conservation tagging programs.
Now having both red- and black-headed Vultures with the ability to actively circle overhead for sanitation purposes will hopefully ensure future generations may benefit from an improved, cleaner environment in the foreseeable future.
By George B. Emmons
