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RandomWiktor — Sunbather
Published: 2006-04-29 23:52:44 +0000 UTC; Views: 109; Favourites: 1; Downloads: 7
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Green Chimmenys is currently, for some reason, infested with these lovely black vultures. I'm thinking its the smell of sun-baked death radiating from the cages of all the birds of prey in their wildlife rehab area. Either way, the vultures are getting so used to people that they let you sneak up and take nice shots like this, so I'm not complaining.Related content
Comments: 4
OMG...wow...
Man, black vultures are scary. They are the much-meaner cousin to turkey vultures, which I love with all my heart. They are reportedly--I assume when not ignoring humans like the one you photographed--very aggressive and will actually kill their food if they see the opportunity. There are alot of stories of them swooping down and killing kittens and such, or attacking the faces/heads of sick or dying animals to speed up the proccess.
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Ah, but does that make them mean, or are they simply better adapted behaviorally for survival?
I love vultures - all vultures. Turkey vultures are definately real sweet hearts, though being projectile vomitted on by one in distress is no fun whatsoever. But I find the black vultures to be unique in thier boldness with humans. While the workers at Green Chimmenys were wheeling the feed cart filled with dead rodents around, they had a whole procession of black vultures hopping along behind them. I wish I could have gotten a pic, but the angle was wrong. I also saw a few of them sunbathing in the company of a massive tom-cat. Talk about fearless!
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Wow!
Yeah, we don't have black vultures around here, so I've only seen turkey vultures in person. They hold a special place in my heart because I use to hang out with them as a kid. From ages 8 til 12 I would collect roadkill and put it in the fields around my house. As soon as they'd circle and land I'd creep out there on my belly with the binoculars. I could tell by their dark plumage which ones were the old buggars and which ones were the chicks from the previous year, which I had watched learning to circle with their parents over our house. I also collected wing feathers and preserved the feet of a dead vulture, and donated them to the nature preserve I worked for. Their feet really are just like that of a big turkey-- no semblance of talons whatsoever. I found it funny that this fact seemed to shock the nature center folk. xD
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