MOUNT VERNON — In the pecking order of vulture dominance in central Ohio, including Knox County, Black vultures, which feed on both carrion and live animals, are gaining wildlife officers’ and livestock owners’ attention much more than does their cousin — the Turkey vulture.
This time of April, as newborn calves are born, livestock owners have to be ever vigilant about protecting their animals from Black vultures, which U.S. Department of Agriculture wildlife management officer Tommy Butler said involves a major part of his work. As part of USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS), he is based in Columbus but travels an area from the Ohio river to central Ohio.
“Just today, on the way up here to Mount Vernon, I spoke with a livestock owner who was asking what to do about Black vultures,” he said. “Advising them is what I spend most of my time doing this time of year. Black vultures are one of those bird species that has an expanding population here in Ohio. For years, they have been moving further north.”
Traditionally, Black vultures were birds with an impressive range that spanned from the southern United States into South America. But over the past two decades, Butler said they have become more prevalent in Ohio, due to different reasons including warmer weather and the elimination of a pesticide, DDT, that used to reduce their numbers by softening their eggs.
Black vultures, Turkey vultures and many other birds that are not considered native to Ohio are protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. Livestock owners can requests permits to get rid of pervasive Black vulture threats to property, which involves completing a Federal Fish and Wildlife Permit Application Form. Butler has to complete a form for each applicant before approval. When permits are issued, which takes up to a week, they allow a landowner to shoot as many as five Black vultures.
But first, Butler said, the USDA wants to ensure that the applicant has done everything at his or her disposal to rid themselves of Black vultures by non-lethal means. There are several ways to do that. Livestock owners will buy Airhorns, honk their trucks at the birds, and buy green lasers to flush them out of trees where they roost.
“What you’re trying to do is getting them conditioned to be scared of the pasture, where they don’t belong,” Butler said. “What I’m getting at is, you’re trying to harass them and get them to go away. And one of the other ways you can do that, is by what we call ‘pyrotechnics.”
By “pyrotechnics,” Butler doesn’t mean 4th of July-style fireworks. But there are two companies with products found online, Reed Joseph and Margo Supplies, which make pyrotechnics specifically geared to scare away Black vultures. These products produce crackling and explosive noises and other sounds the vultures abhor. Pyrotechnics carry names like “Comet Banger” and “Screamer Booster.”
Black vultures are considered to be “smart” birds, Butler said. The thinking is, with enough non-lethal deterrents, they will leave — at least for a time. But there is no “magic bullet” for getting rid of them, he offered. If a landowner has exhausted all non-lethal deterrents at their disposal, they can apply for the permit to kill up to five Black vultures. He recommends to landowners culling just one, and hanging it upside down in a tree in “effigy,” to ward off other Black vultures.
It usually works. Doing so may seem harsh, but the damage they can potentially do to young livestock is cruel in its own description. They attack the “soft tissue” of the animals they are trying to kill or eat alive, including the eyes, Butler said.
The Black Vulture and Turkey vulture — its cousin that only feeds on carrion — are easily distinguished. The Turkey vulture has a slightly wider wingspan and is known to be a “gliding” bird with its “shallow V” shaped wingspan in flight. And, the Turkey vulture has a red head and prominent tail feathers. The Black vulture has a grayish black head, and a flat wingspan in flight. They are more aggressive than Turkey vultures and congregate in groups more than Turkey vultures, which only gather a few at a time.
Butler said he has seen no evidence in the field that Black vultures are supplanting Turkey vultures, despite their being the more aggressive of the two. But they are gaining more in numbers in Ohio. There may be some truth that Black vultures sometimes “follow” or keep an eye on Turkey vultures, if there’s an opportunity to swoop in and snag lots of dead meat.
