Turkey Buzzard is the familiar name applied to this bird, on account
of his remarkable resemblance to our common Turkey. This is the only
respect however, in which they are alike. It inhabits the United
States and British Provinces from the Atlantic to the Pacific, south
through Central and most of South America. Every farmer knows it to
be an industrious scavenger, devouring at all times the putrid or
decomposing flesh of carcasses. They are found in flocks, not only
flying and feeding in company, but resorting to the same spot to
roost; nesting also in communities; depositing their eggs on the
ground, on rocks, or in hollow logs and stumps, usually in thick woods
or in a sycamore grove, in the bend or fork of a stream. The nest is
frequently built in a tree, or in the cavity of a sycamore stump,
though a favorite place for depositing the eggs is a little depression
under a small bush or overhanging rock on a steep hillside.
Renowned naturalists have long argued that the Vulture does not have
an extraordinary power of smell, but, according to Mr. Davie, an
excellent authority, it has been proven by the most satisfactory
experiments that the Turkey Buzzard does possess a keen sense of smell
by which it can distinguish the odor of flesh at a great distance.
The flight of the Turkey Vulture is truly beautiful, and no landscape
with its patches of green woods and grassy fields, is perfect without
its dignified figure high in the air, moving round in circles, steady,
graceful and easy, and apparently without effort. "It sails," says
Dr. Brewer, "with a steady, even motion, with wings just above the
horizontal position, with their tips slightly raised, rises from the
ground with a single bound, gives a few flaps of the wings, and then
proceeds with its peculiar soaring flight, rising very high in the
air."
The Vulture pictured in the accompanying plate was obtained between
the Brazos river and Matagorda bay. With it was found the Black
Vulture, both nesting upon the ground. As the nearest trees were
thirty or forty miles distant these Vultures were always found in this
situation. The birds selected an open spot beneath a heavy growth of
bushes, placing the eggs upon the bare ground. The old bird when
approached would not attempt to leave the nest, and in the case of the
young bird in the plate, the female to protect it from harm, promptly
disgorged the putrid contents of her stomach, which was so offensive
that the intruder had to close his nostrils with one hand while he
reached for the young bird with the other.
The Turkey Vulture is a very silent bird, only uttering a hiss of
defiance or warning to its neighbors when feeding, or a low gutteral
croak of alarm when flying low overhead.
The services of the Vultures as scavengers in removing offal render
them valuable, and almost a necessity in southern cities. If an animal
is killed and left exposed to view, the bird is sure to find out the
spot in a very short time, and to make its appearance as if called by
some magic spell from the empty air.
"Never stoops the soaring Vulture
On his quarry in the desert,
On the sick or wounded bison,
But another Vulture, watching,
From his high aerial lookout,
Sees the downward plunge and follows;
And a third pursues the second,
Coming from the invisible ether,
First a speck, and then a Vulture,
Till the air is dark with pinions."