Mrs Blacktailer and I were wondering why we don't see any buzzards near our home. When we lived in a rural area of the California Central Coast it was common to see 5 or so buzzards at a time and not unusual to see 10-20 or more circling in the updrafts near our home. Here in the desert we have pretty much the same predator and prey species as before with the exception of javelina but never see any buzzards and don't find carrion when out in the desert. Of course anyone who has hunted in Africa knows that by the time you load game in the bakke there will be 200 vultures watching the proceedings. Do javelina clean up the carrion so there is nothing left for buzzards to eat?
I am continually astounded at how quickly people make up their minds on little evidence or none at all. Jack O'Connor
Both Black and Turkey Vultures are migratory throughout most of their range. They are primarily scavengers, although they can (and ocasionally do) capture and kill live prey where the prey species is/are abundant.
I live about 15 or so miles east of the Arizona line, at 4,400 ft elevation in the Animas Valley of southwestern New Mexico. Here, in the overlap of the Chihuahuan and Sonoran deserts, we see lots of Turkey Vultures passing through, both spring and fall. However, both Bald and Golden Eagles winter here, too--and they subsist primarily on road kill and other carrion. They are much more aggressive than the Turkey Vultures which seem to just move on south once the eagles arrive. The Black Vultures are strictly occasional summertime visitors. Additionally, both vultures have circulatory systems that are not especially efficient at regulating body temperatures. They don't do well around here where winter nights are often close to (or below) freezing. It takes them a while to warm up in on sunny mornings after a cold night. Periods of frequent cloud cover during cold days seems to spur them to move on south.
I suspect that you are just not in a major migration corridor, but local availability of prey and carrion probably also play a part.
Last edited by mudhen; 03/11/20.
Ben
Some days it takes most of the day for me to do practically nothing...
It is probably the cold that drives them away. Hadn't thought about it before but it is quite a bit colder here in the winter than it was in Ca and I remember the buzzards sitting on power poles and fence posts with their wings outstretched in the mornings warming up.
I am continually astounded at how quickly people make up their minds on little evidence or none at all. Jack O'Connor
Lots of them in western OK; they are in the east too, but all those trees make it harder to see them.
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"When you disarm the people, you commence to offend them and show that you distrust them either through cowardice or lack of confidence, and both of these opinions generate hatred." Niccolo Machiavelli
Nice link Telano. We have hundreds of those black ones here in FL., but I see by your link that they don't get much farther north than the center of the country. We have a few turkey vultures in WI., but there is no way that they are keeping up with the road kill up there. WI. kills 20,000 deer a year with vehicle crashes and there is near nothing up there to eat them all. If these blacks buzzards would spend half the energy migrating instead of just flying in circles around here, there would be a feast for them up north. It's not unusual to see a dozen of these black ones all over a road killed raccoon and a pig was gone down to the skin and bones in a week.
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Better add... in slightly more interior Alaska. We do not have them here on the coast except when migrating. Coyote are number one in the Chugach Range.
Mark Begich, Joaquin Jackson, and Heller resistance... Three huge reasons to worry about the NRA.
Here in Tx. the fire ants take more turkey polts and fawns than birds of prey, plus the hog kill is really high in some areas. The hogs are especially hard on the nesting hens eating the eggs and the hens too.
The scavengers do a great job as garbage collectors and limiting the possible spread of diseases.
"When you disarm the people, you commence to offend them and show that you distrust them either through cowardice or lack of confidence, and both of these opinions generate hatred." Niccolo Machiavelli
Here in Tx. the fire ants take more turkey polts and fawns than birds of prey, plus the hog kill is really high in some areas. The hogs are especially hard on the nesting hens eating the eggs and the hens too.
The scavengers do a great job as garbage collectors and limiting the possible spread of diseases.
Rotten bastards. Glad we don't have very many of em in our neck of the woods.
Dad did get one on trail cam last fall.
The last time that bear ate a lawyer he had the runs for 33 days!
