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Black Vulture | Coragyps atratus
Zwarte gier | Zopilote común
The Black Vulture is the most numerous vulture in the guide area and a familiar sight over villages, towns, rubbish dumps and fishing harbours. It lives in groups, roosts communally and finds carrion mainly by sight, often by following Turkey Vultures or other Black Vultures. In the guide area it occurs from northern Mexico to Panama, except in Baja California and in the high mountains.
Voice
Lacks a syrinx; almost silent. Hisses and grunts at carcasses, at the roost and at the nest.
Recording: JAYRSON ARAUJO DE OLIVEIRA — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
56–74 cm, stocky, with broad, rather short wings and a short, square tail that the feet reach to the tip in flight. The plumage is uniform black. The head and neck are bare, wrinkled and dark grey. Below and above, a whitish patch at the base of the primaries stands out, at the wingtip only. Flies with a series of quick, shallow wingbeats alternating with short glides, wings held flat. Juveniles have a smoother, black head. The sexes are alike.
Confusion species
The Turkey Vulture Cathartes aura has longer, narrower wings held in a V, a longer tail, silvery grey flight feathers along the whole wing and, in adults, a red head; it rocks in flight and rarely flaps. Young King Vultures Sarcoramphus papa are also blackish, but larger, with broader wings and no white wingtips. The Common Black Hawk Buteogallus anthracinus has a feathered head, yellow legs and a white tail band.
Habitat
Open and semi-open country, from towns, villages, rubbish dumps and slaughterhouses to pastures, savanna, beaches, riverbanks and forest edges; mainly in the lowlands and valleys, locally to about 2500 m. Nests on the ground in a hollow among rocks, in a hollow log or in an abandoned building. Feeds on carrion and refuse, but also kills small animals such as hatchling sea turtles and young herons.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
Common throughout almost the whole guide area: from Sonora, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León and Tamaulipas south through all of Mexico and Central America to Panama. Absent from Baja California, where it occurs at most as a vagrant in the north, and from the highest mountains. Outside the guide area from the south-eastern United States to Chile and Argentina.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
Can be seen over almost every lowland town and village, often in large numbers at rubbish dumps, fish markets and slaughterhouses and on roofs and antenna masts. In the morning birds sit drying in the sun with spread wings.
Conservation status
Not threatened. Common, and benefits from human refuse; in the United States it is expanding northwards. Locally birds are poisoned or driven away at rubbish dumps and livestock farms.
Scientific name
Coragyps atratus | (Bechstein, 1793)
Bechstein described the species in 1793 as Vultur atratus; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Coragyps was introduced in 1853 by Le Maout. Coragyps is Greek, from korax 'raven' and gups 'vulture': 'raven-vulture', after the black plumage. atratus is Latin for 'clothed in black', as in mourning, after the black plumage. The specimen the first description was based on came from St. Johns River, Florida.