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| [Note Guidelines] Photographer's Note |
This is a egyptian vulture juvenile. It's parents have roosted on the top of a water tank on the campus near hall of residence VII. It was shot a little distance from it's home while hovering on lower ganges canal. It's parents were closely observing my act of shooting so that they can rescue it from coming to any danger. Such a close knit family.
Egyptian Vulture
Neophron percnopterus
Size: The Egyptian Vulture is the smallest of all the European Vultures.
Voice:
Diet/Feeding: Most well known for its evolved abiltity to eat eggs, the Egyptian vulture's diet also includes both carrion and overripe vegetable matter. When feeding with crows and small raptors, this vulture is dominant. They must wait, however, for other larger vultures to finish their meal at a carcass, before entering the scene. Once the carcass is abandined, the birds fly in and pick the small bits of remaining meat from the bones with their delicate beaks.
Among other favored foods are decaying fruits and vegetables, often salvaged from human garbage dumps, and small insects, which the bird can catch alive. Without a sense of smell, the Egyptian vultures rely on their keen eyesight to find all food. Their vision is twice as refined as that of a human, allowing them to see an object 4 to 8 centimeters in diameter from as high as 1000 meters.
Flight: This vulture flies with more wingbeats than most vultures, but takes off much more gracefully, as it is built lighter and smaller. Once gliding, the bird holds its wings flat, shifting them very little. The bird posesses great endurance, and is able to fly up to 70 kilometers in search of food.
Range/Habitat: This species of vulture is a very adaptable, inhabiting various habitat types, and slowly estblishing territories closer and closer to humans. These birds can often be seen feeding around garbage dumps. Among the natural habitats favored by the Egyptian vulture are plains, wetlands, uplands, and mountains. They are found ranging through southern Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and India.
Behavior: Egyptian vultures are specialists in egg-eating. They are among the only known birds in the world to use stones as tools. They will repeatedly strike at an abandoned ostrich egg with stones, then use their beak to enlarge the hole and penetrate membrane. This behavior is not instinctive, but learned from other vultures, as the species is very intelligent.
Life Cycle: Young fledge at about 3 months of age. Juvenile plumage is brown, strikingly different from the pure white adults.
Breeding: Males and females are alike in plumage, but females are usually slightly larger than their mate. Beautiful breeding displays are performed by the both sexes. They fly high into the air and dive back down, grasping claws on the way.
They prefer to nest on rocky ledges and in cliffs, preferring well-sheltered areas with many cavities, as the birds are colonial nesters. They lay 1 to 3 eggs, which they incubate for 42 days. They have the ability to lay a new egg if one is destroyed or taken before hatching.
Status: Illegal hunting and direct persecution of this species still take place all over the vulture's habitat and migratory routes. In Spain, France, Greece, and Turkey, they vulture is intentionally poisoned by agriculturalists who wrongfully believe it carries disease. This has been the primary cause of large declines in Egyptian vulture population.
Folklore, Misc. Information: The first recorded bird ever to be protectedby law, this bird was very close to one Pharaoh's heart. Feeling that their job as natural cleaners was very important, he forbade anyone to kill an Egyptian vulture. The crime was punishable by death. After this ruling, the bird came to be called "Pharaoh's Chicken."
An Egyptian Vulture in many languages:
English: Egyptian Vulture, Pharaoh's Chicken
Latin: Neophron percnopterus, literally " |
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