The Value of Vultures - What’s a vulture worth? A lot more than you might think.

Illustration by Kelsey King

June 4, 2014 — Editor’s note: The following is excerpted from What Has Nature Ever Done For Us? How Money Really Does Grow on Trees (2013) by Tony Juniper. In the book the author explores the economic value of nature, pointing to examples of natural services that are (or were) provided for free by nature, and which are being removed at our cost.  Juniper argues that in light of this realization we should stop treating natural systems in a destructive manner. Published here with permission from Synergetic Press. 

One bright clear morning in April 1993 I was aboard a British Airways 747 that was preparing to land at New Delhi Airport in India. As the aircraft started its final descent from about 1,000 meters, I noticed vultures. Their broad wings, with flight feathers spread out like a span of long fingers, had taken them to the height of the plane. From this vantage point their incredibly sharp vision would enable them to scan the land for the dead animals they feasted on.

Riding thermals just a few hundred meters from where I sat, the huge soaring birds flashed by the windows. It crossed my mind that one might get sucked into an engine, as from time to time they do. Aside from immediate safety worries, I was fascinated to see such a number of large birds of prey flying over a built-up sprawl of houses, roads and industry. I was impressed by their abundance — little did I know that these birds were in big trouble. About a year earlier vulture numbers in India had begun to go down — and fast.

Three different kinds of vultures are native to India and all of them had recently declined at a truly unprecedented rate. There were about 40 million vultures in India in 1993, but by 2007 the population of the long-billed vulture had dropped by nearly 97 percent. For the oriental white-backed vulture it was even worse, with a 99.9 percent drop in numbers during that same period. In other words, it had gone virtually extinct.

Source & for further read click here: Ensia