Conservationists said Friday that at least 150 extremely endangered vultures were poisoned to death in separate events in Botswana and South Africa, bringing the birds closer to extinction. Poisoning of vultures is not commonplace in wildlife-rich southern Africa, where poachers target them because they bring unwelcome attention to their unlawful operations.
According to wildlife organizations, the heads of the birds are also used in traditional medicine.
According to the vulture conservation organization Vulpro, more than 50 white-backed vultures were discovered dead in Botswana’s northern Chobe sector on Friday, while over 100 more were discovered dead in South Africa’s Kruger National Park on Thursday. According to the organization, the bird’s heads, feet, and organs were removed.
“Vulture populations cannot endure these losses, and extinction is creeping ever closer,” the organization said on Facebook.
According to Vulpro creator Kerri Wolter, the birds perished in both incidents after feasting on a buffalo corpse that seemed to be tainted with poison.
“What makes this even more tragic is that it’s breeding season,” Wolter told AFP, noting that without their parents, chicks would perish.
South African park authorities claimed they were looking into the event and that some of the corpses seemed to have been collected for their body parts.
“Given the crucial condition of vultures internationally, poisonings on this magnitude put the species at risk of extinction,” Yolan Friedmann, the conservation organization Endangered Wildlife Trust, said in a statement about the Kruger event.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) “red list” of severely endangered bird species includes the white-backed vulture.
In 2019, 537 vulture corpses were found in Botswana’s Chobe game reserve, making it one of the greatest vulture fatalities in recent years.