Local News
Vultures still under threat─── SABRINA DEAN 07:29 Sat, 06 Sep 2014
Sabrina Dean Kimberley - The plight of one of the most important links in maintaining a healthy ecosystem is in the spotlight Saturday as the world celebrates International Vulture Awareness Day.
Beryl Wilson, a zoologist from the McGregor Museum in Kimberley, says despite numerous remarkable adaptations, vulture numbers are under threat due to factors ranging from lack of food, habitat loss or electric shocks, to being hunted to harvest parts for the muti trade. She says poachers also pose a threat as they poison carcasses and an estimated 2000 white backed vultures have been killed in this manner recently.
Wilson describes vultures as the undertakers of the veld and says there is no other species that fills the same role in terms of cleaning up nature’s waste products and preventing the spread of disease. She says a decline in vulture numbers poses serious environmental and economic risks.
Beryl Wilson, a zoologist from the McGregor Museum in Kimberley, speaks on International Vulture Awareness Day:
