I confess — I love vultures! These largish flying machines ply the sky doing their evolutionary duties as nature’s cleaning crews. They seek out carrion and serve humankind well as garbage collectors of dead animals.

Not only do they effectively remove offal from our landscapes, but they also prevent the spread of disease in humans and other animals. How? Their strong gastric juices — up to 100 times more acidic than ours — enable them to digest the meat, bones, and other parts of their deceased prey and also destroy viruses that would spread from rotting flesh. These diseases include tuberculosis, rabies, botulism, distemper, cholera, salmonella, and anthrax.

What is particularly cool is that unlike smaller, skulking birds and other wildlife, our two vulture species are ubiquitous and easy to see in our skies and along roadsides. Both the turkey and black vulture can be sighted patrolling our air space daily, gliding and soaring with wing spans exceeding 5 feet.

North America has only one other vulture, the rare and endangered California condor, the largest bird in North America. The population fell to just 22 birds in the 1980s, but there are now 230 in California, Arizona, and Baja California, with another 160 in captivity. Lead poisoning from lead shot in dead animals remains a severe threat to their long-term prospects. While at the American Bird Conservancy, I assisted in assuring their reintroduction in Arizona from captive breeding.

The three North American vultures are part of a proud family of 23 global species including the Andean condor, which I sighted flying over the Andes while I was hiking at 11,000 feet in Ecuador. With a wingspan approaching 11 feet, it is considered the world’s largest bird of prey. What spectacular flying machines!

So, how do you find and tell our two vultures apart? First, search the day sky. Turkey vultures fly with wings distinctly tilted upward in a “V.” They have a silvery edge to their lower wings, and often rock back-and-forth as they soar. They make few wing beats as they circle on heated thermals, rising and dropping in their search for meals — true wind surfers. Blackish brown except for their bald red heads and white lower legs, their featherless heads are a unique vulture feature that allows them to dine on dead animals without clogging their feathers.

Black vultures are all black, with white legs like their cousins and a bare black head. They appear squatter. Their wings have whitish tips, and they flap more, often in threes, and delay daily flights until the air warms to rise on stronger thermals. The turkey vulture has a much better sense of smell to detect carrion so black vultures follow the lead of their cousin raptors. The so-called “TV” can detect an animal carcass from 8 miles away with its extraordinary olfactory senses. They can help detect natural gas leaks — the gas contains the same compound found in carrion — and can be seen circling above the leak.

A turkey vulture dines on a discarded turkey carcass in the Winegrad’s backyard. (Carol Swan)

These two species frequently soar together and there may be hawks with them providing opportunities for comparison. It took me awhile, but now I find it easy to discern the turkey from the black as their jizz is so different.

Their daily flights above us are just one enthralling part of nature. I am always looking and, if you look, you are going to see vultures doing their thing. While driving, I escape the humdrum with vulture sightings, and they help satiate my joyful appetite for all creatures great and small.

When observing, you can also find other species, whether walking, driving, or daydreaming as long as you are outdoors. One bird sighting that can be confused with vultures is the bald eagle, especially the immature eagles that do not have the distinctive white head and tail. An ID giveaway for detection is that bald eagles always soar with their wings flat. But readily discerning the difference takes practice.

Being carrion eaters, vultures have sharp, large bills to tear the meat of decaying critters. They have rather weak talons on their feet. Unlike the TV, the black vulture does occasionally take live animals including skunks, opossums, and very young pigs, lambs, and calves. They also are dumpster divers and habituate landfills to pick at human discards.

A handsome black vulture joins the Winegrads on their deck rail attracted by a discarded turkey carcass. (Carol Swan)

The TV ranges throughout the U.S., the lower tier of Canada, Central America, and all the way to the tip of South America. The black vulture is much more restricted in the U.S. and found only in the Southeast and West to mid-Texas although with global warming, the black vulture has now reached New England. It has the same wide distribution as the TV south of the U.S.

These 30-inch-long scavengers can live as long as 25 years. They make no sounds except long, low hissing noises. When threatened, vultures will projectile vomit from their incredibly acidic stomach contents up to 10 feet — don’t ever mess with a vulture on the ground. When overheating, vultures urinate onto a leg. As the liquid evaporates, it cools off blood circulating in the leg, lowering body temperature.

Our New World vultures don’t build typical nests, laying their eggs in tree cavities, rocky surfaces, caves, thickets, and brush piles. These sites are typically much cooler than surrounding areas and isolated from human disturbance. Our vultures are monogamous, mate for life, lay one to three eggs, and both parents incubate the eggs and feed the chicks. They are devoted parents with strong family bonds.

Unlike so many declining avian species, our two vultures are doing well. Turkey vultures increased across North America by 1.8% annually from 1966 to 2019 with a global breeding population of 28 million. Black vultures increased by 3.4% annually between 1966 and 2019 with the global breeding population estimated at 190 million. Banning DDT and ending the persecution of these scavengers helped them to flourish as did increased roadkill and more menu items from trash. But vultures still fall victim to poisons and lead shot in dead animals.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture killed more than 18,000 last year, mostly black ones, because of property damage or predation on young livestock. While at the American Bird Conservancy, I collaborated with ornithologists and conservationists to tamp down this unnecessary killing.

Unfortunately, more than half of the world’s vulture species are listed as endangered. In India, medicine given to livestock led to the death of 90% of the country’s vultures. Captive breeding recovery programs are now underway. Poachers also purposely poison vultures so the vultures won’t give away their location when they are killing other animals.

The word vulture comes from the Latin vellere, which means to pluck or tear. The turkey vulture’s scientific name, Cathartes aura, means either “golden purifier” or “purifying breeze.” Other North American birds, including bald eagles. feed on dead animals. However, the best-known carrion eaters are the vultures. And please remember — vultures are not buzzards, a common misnomer.

So, be looking, be inquisitive, and be thinking: “Thank you vulture for your great ecological services in preventing the spread of disease.” Keep your eyes open and probe into the fascinating world of vultures, part of Nature’s Greatest Show on Earth.

Gerald Winegrad represented the greater Annapolis area in the General Assembly for 16 years. Contact him at gwwabc@comcast.net.