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Re: Vulture vs Martins



With regards to urban/suburban vultures, last summer one of my 
neighbors put an exceptionally stinky bunch of spoiled shellfish in 
his big plastic dumpster. With weekly garbage pick-up, the stench was 
tremendous after a few days, with lots of flies buzzing about. Soon 
about a half-dozen Black Vultures (no Turkey Vultures at all, even 
though they are commonly seen in our neighborhood) appeared, landing 
on his deck and prowling around, looking for the carrion, which they 
never found, since it was inside a covered dumpster. I managed to get 
several photos--the birds were wary, but not terribly so.

All of this is in the Parkwood neighborhood of Durham, NC, plenty of 
mid-sized trees, but with small lots (mine is 1/3 acre). This is 
definitely middle-class USA, or at least I like to think so!

It was interesting to me that the Black Vultures, with allegedly a 
poorer sense of smell than the Turkey Vultures, were the ones to come 
down. (It seemed clear to me that the smell was what attracted the 
Black Vultures.) Perhaps the Turkey Vultures were too nervous about 
all the human activity nearby. TV's are much more wary than Black 
Vultures, in my experience.

>
>As to whether vultures will come close to suburban yards:
>I'm sure most of you have seen old pictures of vultures walking
>around in cities and towns like Ring-billed Gulls--think they still
>do this in Central America, and perhaps they still do this regularly
>at some places in the U.S.  The old Birds of America (T. Gilbert
>Pearson)
>has a photo of Black Vultures walking in the streets of Charleston.
>(early in the 19th century I guess).

-- 

Patrick Coin
Durham, NC
patrick@coinconsult.net