New World vultures | Cathartidae

Nieuwewereldgieren | Buitres del Nuevo Mundo

Mexico and Central America hold five species in four genera: Black and Turkey Vultures can be seen almost everywhere, from towns and rubbish dumps to open country and coast, the Lesser Yellow-headed Vulture glides low over savanna and marsh, the King Vulture lives above undisturbed lowland forest, and the California Condor has been reintroduced in the mountains of Baja California. The head and often the neck are bare, which makes it easier to keep clean when feeding on carcasses; in the King Vulture this skin is bright orange, red and purple. The wings are long and broad, and the birds soar for hours without flapping. Turkey and yellow-headed vultures find carrion by smell, a sense developed this well in few other birds, and other vultures follow them to it. The feet are weak and not used for grasping, the nostrils are perforate and a voice box is lacking, so only hisses and grunts are heard. In hot weather they soil their legs with droppings to cool down. No nest is built: one or two eggs lie in a hollow tree, a rock crevice or on a ledge, and the young are fed on regurgitated food.