A Spring Riddle!

Here's a riddle for you:

What do Spring Day and Vultures have in common?
Well, here's the answer. The first Saturday in September is International Vulture Awareness Day, which, this year, happens to coincide with Spring Day! Or Autumn Day for those of you reading this in the Northern Hemisphere!

Thanks to EWT.

The purpose of the day is to highlight the plight of vultures and the work done by conservationists to implement affective measures to conserve the birds and their habitat. South Africa first celebrated the day in 2005, and since then global interest and support has increased. By 2011,  159 organisations representing 44 countries were involved. Hopefully this year will have even more support.

This is what the EWT newsletter contained:

South Africa is home to no less than nine vulture species. Seven of these species are listed in the Red Data Book of Birds of South Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland (Barnes, 2000) as facing a certain degree of threat of extinction. The Bearded Vulture Gypaetus barbatus, whose range in southern Africa is restricted to the Maluti-Drakensberg mountains in South Africa and Lesotho is classified as “Endangered” and continues to decline in numbers due to a range of factors. The Cape Vulture Gyps coprotheres only occurs within southern Africa and the conservation of this species remains one of the main focal areas of the EWT-BoPP. Both the Hooded Necrosyrtes monachus and African White-backed Vulture Gyps africanus were up-listed to “Endangered” in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species during the last 12 months. Other species, such as the Lappet-faced Torgos tracheliotus and White-headed Trigonoceps occipitalis mostly occur in large conservation areas in South Africa and are listed as “Vulnerable”.

Vultures are faced with a range of threats such as poisoning, persecution, electrocution and collision with power-lines, drowning in farm reservoirs in drier parts of the country, shortage of safe food supplies and loss of suitable habitat. The potential impact of indiscriminately placed wind-energy installations is today recognised as a major emerging threat to large soaring birds such as vultures. A considerable number of installations of this nature are planned for South Africa and it is imperative that the placement of such sites should consider and attempt to avoid the potentially devastating impact that they may have on the populations of these already threatened birds.'                          Thanks to EWT and Andre Botha.

Sobering words.

Vultures are also very mobile and can cover hundreds of kilometres per day in search of food. This makes effective conservation difficult as they happily cross borders in their search, and conservation priorities differ greatly from country to country. Cumbersome and comical on the ground, they scrabble and clamber over a carcass, tearing and pulling and poking into corners and holes. When they perch in trees they look just like mourners at a funeral, but once they take off and catch the thermals, they become almost poetic.

Let's hope that they do not become just another memory in years to come, like so many other birds, animals, plants and marine species.

Oh, by the way, Happy Spring Day!