Vultures are being poisoned across Africa at alarming rates, primarily as bycatch from poaching operations and deliberate persecution. This welfare crisis threatens entire ecosystems that depend on their scavenging role.
Vultures poisoned at carcasses die in large numbers in slow, agonising ways from compounds including carbofuran, aldicarb, and other agricultural pesticides. Mass mortality events kill not just one or two birds but entire flocks simultaneously, decimating local populations. The conservation consequences compound the welfare harm: with fewer vultures to clean carcasses, disease spreads among other wildlife and livestock. The loss of vultures from an ecosystem is not merely a conservation loss — it represents the removal of a welfare-protective sanitation service that other animals depend on.