Fri 12 August 2022:
Conservationists said that in separate incidents in Botswana and South Africa, at least 150 highly endangered vultures were poisoned to death. They warned that the mass killings brought the birds closer to extinction, AFP reported.
According to vulture conservation organization Vulpro, the most recent cases were more than 50 white-backed vultures who were discovered dead on Friday in Botswana’s northern Chobe sector and over 100 more that were found dead on Thursday in South Africa’s Kruger National Park.
“The repercussions of these poisonings are huge. It’s breeding season so their chicks will not survive and breeding pairs have been lost for good,” the organisation tweeted.
We unfortunately end this week with some exceptionally sad news. Over the last 2 days, 150 vultures have been poisoned in two separate incidents (1 in Kruger National Park and the other Chobe Botswana). These killings were aimed at targeting vultures for muti. pic.twitter.com/4YIYOKqZQh
— VulPro (@WeLoveVultures) August 12, 2022
“Vulture populations cannot withstand these losses and the threat of extinction creeps ever closer.”
In both poisoning cases, the birds died after feeding from the carcass of a buffalo, which appeared to have been laced with poison, Vulpro’s founder Kerri Wolter said.
“What makes this even more catastrophic is that it’s breeding season now” and chicks will not survive without their parents, Wolter said.
The incident is being investigated into, according to park officials in South Africa, who also noted that some of the carcasses appeared to have been harvested for their body parts.
“Given the critical status of vultures globally, poisonings at this scale place the species at increasing risk of extinction,” Yolan Friedmann, the head of the Endangered Wildlife Trust conservation group, said in a statement on the Kruger incident.
2019 saw one of the greatest vulture deaths in Botswana history, with 537 carcasses found in the Chobe game reserve after the birds consumed the remains of three elephants killed by poachers.
SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES
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