Vulture population depleting in India

Nava Thakuria

As the vultures in the sky are missing, the government and non-government agencies and organizations in India have come forward to bring back the scavenging birds. The scientist and environmentalists apprehend that after Pakistan and Nepal the vulture population in India has declined by more than 97 per cent in the last few years.
   In India there were about 40 million vultures in early eighties, but a survey conducted by Mumbai Natural History Society in 2007 revealed that there remained nearly 11,000 white-backed vultures, 1000 slender-billed vultures and 44,000 long-billed vultures in the country, said Dr Vibhu Prakash, the principal scientist for the vulture conservation breeding programme at BNHS, Mumbai. Statistics reveal that India has nine species of vultures in the wild including the Oriental White-backed Vulture, Long-billed Vulture, Slender-billed Vulture, Egyptian Vulture, Red-headed Vulture, Indian Griffon Vulture, Himalayan Griffon, Cinereous Vulture and Bearded Vulture.
   
   Endangered types
   Among them, the white-backed, long-billed and slender-billed vultures are recognized as critically endangered by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. More over, they are listed as Schedule I species in the Indian Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972, which is applicable to the tiger and one-horned rhino also. Rapid urbanization, destruction of habitat (primarily the loss of high-rise trees, where the vultures go for nesting) and many other modern day factors (like the rampant use of pesticides-DDT, hitting aircraft, other moving objects in the sky, electric lines and even poisoning of vultures in some cases) have caused the decline of vulture population in South and Southeast Asia. In fact, the vultures were almost wiped out from Bangladesh, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Malaysia, and Singapore by nineties. Now the countries like Pakistan, Nepal and India are losing the vulture population drastically.
   A matured vulture may weigh up to 10kgs and it needs almost half-a-kg meat everyday. And the most common theory emerges from here that vultures die of eating toxic meat with high percentage of diclofenac residue.
   It may be mentioned that diclofenac is a commonly used veterinary drug. Scientists suspect that the diclofenac remains active for a longer period in the carcasses of those treated animals, which finally affects vultures, as they consume the meat. The drugs reportedly cause dehydration of the vultures and soon they die of visceral gout and even kidney failure.
   A specialist claims that there is very strong evidence suggesting that diclofenac was the cause of the mortality of vultures.
   The BNHS started launching a rigorous campaign against the diclofenac since 2003. India introduced the drugs in 1993. Following the BNHS initiative and the long standing demand from environment and animal protection groups, New Delhi banned the manufacture and importation of diclofenac for veterinary purposes in 2006. Later Nepal and Pakistan also banned it.
   In Nepal, where all species including white-rumped, sender-billed and red-headed vultures have been facing declination drastically, an innovative way is adopted. The Bird Conservation Nepal has launched three vulture restaurants in the Tarai areas of the country. Titled Zatayu Restaurant for the scavengers, they collect the dying cows from different villages and later their carcasses are offered to the vultures.
   A newsletter of Bird Conservation Nepal says that the country had 150,000 breeding pairs of white-rumped vultures nearly 15 years ago. But the scavenging bird population has decreased by 99 percent over the years. The NGO believes that 'the use of diclofenac on animals is continuing in India and Nepal, despite the ban. There is always suspicion that diclofenac made for human needs are being used for veterinary purposes. Hence, the BNHS continues pursuing the government to make some warnings against the veterinarian use of human diclofenac.
   The birds at Pinjore and Rajabhatkhawa were brought from different parts of the country. But those are at Rani are largely from its own State. Of course, 14 slender-billed vultures at Pinjore and 12 slender-billed vultures at Rajabhatkhawa have been brought from Assam. Our objective is to have 50 birds of each of the three species at Pinjore and Rajabhatkhawa and 50 birds each of white-backed and long-billed vulture at Rani," revealed the official adding that seventy five percent of the vultures are (will be) collected as nestlings or juveniles and rest as adults or sub-adults. Mentionable that Among Indian States, Assam , West Bengal , Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Maharahtra have reported the natural breeding population of vultures. The Union environment ministry has also decided to establish four additional rescue and breeding centres in Hyderabad (Andhra Pradesh), Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh), Bhubaneshwar (Orissa) and Junagarh (Gujarat) under the supervision of the Central Zoo Authority of India. It is however not only the environmentalists who expressed concern at the declining of vultures from the sky, but the Parsi people of India remained equally worried at the development, though for a religious reason.
   The Parsis, who fled Persia-the present-day Iran-centuries back and made India their permanent homeland, practise the religion of Zoroastrianism. Nearly 100,000 Parsi people live in major cities like Mumbai, Hyderabad and Kolkata.
   Many Mumbai Parsis have been pursuing a plan to breed vultures in captivity. However, Minal Shroff, the chairman of the Bombay Parsee Panchayat, which runs the Tower of Silence, said scientists studying the proposal shelved it, saying it will not be possible since vultures appear to be particularly susceptible to diclofenac. But many donot subscribe the theory of captive breeding of vultures. Dr. Anil Kumar Chhangani, a wildlife expert from Department of Zoology, JNV University, Jodhpur, also expressed skepticism at the process of vulture captive breeding as there was no such expertise among Indian organizations.
   He cautioned, "Authorities must plan well while selecting the breeding stock for captive breeding. Birds most suitable for the purpose should be selected, rather than unsystematically and unscientifically collecting chicks from their natural habitat, disturbing natural breeding."
   Anil, who was associated with IUCN Birds and Mammals Breeding Specialist Group reiterated, "The captive breeding should not be the only way to conserve vultures. Rather a countrywide rescue programme for the vultures should be encouraged."
   But Soumyadeep Datta, an environmental activist of Northeast argues that the captive breeding of vultures would result nothing. "The matured vultures select their partners in the wild for breeding and the birds lay eggs in such a situation, which cannot be arranged in the captivity. Only one egg is expected from a pair in one season. The caring mother continues its close bond with the baby till the chick attains maturity by five years. For any reason, vultures do not go for mating with other species," analyzed Datta, who serves as the director of Nature's Beckon, an Assam based environmental NGO. Datta, while talking to this writer also asserted that the indiscriminate lifting of chicks, as done by the BNHS people in Assam, from the nests would only disrupt the male-female ratio of the vultures. He also claims that unlike the other parts of India, the population of white-backed vulture and long-billed vultures have been stable if not increased in the State. The natural breeding process of vultures is continuing in Assam, he claimed.
   The members of Nature's Beckon suspect that the BNHS people had started capturing vulture chick and adults in Assam since 2005. In the long period, they must have captured nearly 100 adult and semi-adult vultures from the State and most of them were taken to the captive breeding centres of Haryana and West Bengal.
   Maximum number of vultures was captured from Tinsukia and Dibrugarh districts, where as Goalpara, Dhubri, Lakhimpur, Sibsagar and Jorhat districts of Assam were also targeted by the BNHS people. Those captured vultures were first brought to Guwahati by road and then flown to New Delhi and once again taken road to arrive at Pinjore. On the other hand, trapped vultures were taken to Rajabhatkhoa completely by road from the place of capture.
   Asad Rahmani, the director of BNHS, has however denied allegation that removing some chicks from the nests would disrupt the sex ratio of vultures. He argues that the sex of any chick/young is random (except in some reptiles where it is temperature dependent). In every conception, there are equal chances that it could be a male or a female. In any large population of animals, this includes human being also the sex ratio is statistically 1:1 (or 50:50).
   Whatever their fate, it is certain that it will take a longtime to restore the native population by captive breeding. Nita Shah, the BNHS vulture advocacy program officer, acknowledges that vultures breed slowly. As they give birth to only one chick a year and a baby takes nearly four years to attain sexual maturity, she said, nobody should hope 'for the population to be restored to its original size within our lifetime'.

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