But many ecologists are now warning that vultures across the planet are under serious threat thanks to habitat loss, deliberate and accidental poisoning, and use of the birds’ body parts as traditional medicine cures. In Africa – where vulture losses are expected to reach 70% to 97% over the next 50 years – the causes are more varied. Facebook Twitter Pinterest A market trader offers the body of a lappet-faced vulture at the Faraday muthi market in Johannesburg. The poison goes through the systems of both cattle and predator and is eaten by vultures, which then die. Several conservation groups are now working to try to save the world’s vultures, as is revealed in Hamilton James’s photographs.

Source: The Guardian October 15, 2016 23:03 UTC