Posted on 03/28/2006 9:05:07 PM PST by TigerLikesRooster
March 28, 2006
India's Vultures Fall Prey to a Drug in the Cattle They Feed On
By AMELIA GENTLEMAN
NEW DELHI, March 27 — Until recently the vulture was an integral part of the Indian landscape. Vultures were so abundant that ornithologists never even thought to monitor their population.
But conservationists are now warning that a drug used to treat sick cows in South Asia is killing the scavenging vultures by the millions. They say the drug is responsible for a 97 percent decline in the species in India during the past decade.
Wildlife experts have criticized what they call the government's lethargic approach to a promised ban on the drug, diclofenac, a cheap painkiller for cattle that is poisonous to vultures.
"The government's failure to act is increasingly frustrating," said Chris Bowden, the head of the vulture conservation program of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, in Britain. "This delay is making full extinction of these birds much more likely."
Vibhu Prakash, the principal scientist at the Bombay Natural History Society, agreed that "the situation is very, very serious."
"The ban was promised in March 2005 and it should have been put in place by now," he said. "With the population of these species declining by more than 50 percent a year, we don't have much time left."
On a warm summer's day above the Timarpur garbage dump in north Delhi, the sky would often be black with hundreds of vultures looking for cattle carcasses. With so many of these heavy, ungainly birds in the sky, pilots taking off from Delhi's airports lived in constant fear of vultures smashing into their engines.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Flight safety is vastly improved. Dramatically reduced chances of bird strike.
So what is the enviro's plan if they cannot get their way? Introducing hyenas in place of vultures instead?
Ping!
What is wrong with calls to protect vultures from going extinct, especially if the extinction is (partly/wholly) due to humans? Vultures should be protected because they feed on dead carcass. And they stop the spread of rotting flesh bacteria and diseases especially in a hot and humid place like India.
Relax...I was poking fun. Don't take everything so serious!
Oh, sorry! I didn't know you were poking fun.
If they ate beef, they wouldn't need so many vultures to eat carcasses in the dump.
OTOH, if they treated the cows' dieseases, instead of pumping them full of pain killers to disguise the symptoms, the cows would live longer AND the vultures wouldn't be getting poisoned.
First off....vultures feed on dead animals....so if the drug was working there wouldn't be any dead cows lying around for the vultures to feed on.
Second....if the drug is so toxic it kills large preditors like vultures....stands to reason it will knock off a few cows.
Third....what about the recovered cows...still have that toxic stuff in them and so unfit for milk / and or human consumption.
Finally.... and for those with shoe fetish....don't suck on leather shoes for a month or so.....as a major Indian export is leather from dead cows that is subsequently turned into shoes..
enjoy
bump & a ping
I wonder what going on. Are cow owners giving diclofenac to all of the lame, and the stuff doesn't get sufficiently metabolized before they die of old age?
"If they ate beef, they wouldn't need so many vultures to eat carcasses in the dump."
I doubt the carcasses in the dump are just cattle. A lot of dead animals are present. Where do you think all those street dogs, cats, and other animals end up. All in the dump.
And dead cows are not normally discarded, but used in the leather industry. India has one of the biggest leather industries in the world -- dead cows are put to use. A lot of Muslims and shoe-making castes depend on dead cows' skin.
There's an interesting consequence to the decline of vultures - the religious beliefs of the Parsis require that dead bodies be exposed above ground so the flesh can be removed by vultures (IIRC earth, fire, and water are considered sacred elements that shouldn't be defiled by decaying flesh). The decline in vultures has forced them to alter their practices.
The tissue residue is probably inconsequential and this story is in need of some scrutiny. It doesn't pass my smell test....
Actually, this does pass the (rotten) smell test.
Mammals, which includes humans and cows, can metabolize diclofenac. Vultures cannot - hence it is toxic to them but (at reasonable doses), not toxic to us.
Royal P.E.T.A?
After reading the research I think there is some validity to the hypothesis. In the US we can't use those NSAIDS in cattle because of residue. Europe, India and Africa are not as stringent about drug use in food animals as the FDA.
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