The last hope for vultures

At least four species are seen in the Sigur plateau in the Mudumalai Tiger Reserve

The Sigur plateau in the Mudumalai Tiger Reserve (MTR) in the Nilgiris is one of the last remaining regions where a sizeable breeding vulture population is clinging on in Southern India. At least four species of India’s vultures are seen in the region, and at least three are believed to be using the plateau to breed and nest.

The region could potentially help critically endangered vulture species recolonise the surrounding landscapes from where they have become locally extinct over the last few decades because of the use of Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs (NSAIDs) to treat cattle. Due to the use of drugs like diclofenac since the early 1990s, vulture populations across India have plummeted as they died after feeding on the carcasses of cattle treated with the drugs. Four of India’s nine vulture species have been listed as “critically endangered” by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Three of the four species seen regularly in the Sigur are on the “critically endangered” list, while the other, the Egyptian vulture, is classified as being “endangered”.

H. Byju, a researcher who has studied vultures in the Sigur plateau and the Moyar Valley, says the future of vultures remains precarious in the Sigur. “For a population of vultures to be considered stable requires at least 800 pairs, while Sigur, which has the largest population of vultures in southern India, hardly has 300 individuals,” said the author of Valley of Hope–Vultures and Moyar.

According to S. Manigandan, a research scholar with Arulagam, a conservation NGO working on protecting vultures in the landscape, the latest surveys in the MTR buffer zone indicate that there are between 110 and 120 white-rumped vultures ( Gyps bengalensis), 11 and 15 Indian or long-billed vultures ( Gyps indicus) and maybe up to 5 Asian king vultures ( Sarcogyps calvus) in Sigur.

Mr. Manigandan says that during the most recent breeding season, only 14 nests of the white-rumped vulture have seen successful hatching of vulture chicks, while three nests of the long-billed vulture are also believed to have hatchlings. Despite the best efforts of researchers for more than a decade, the nesting site of the Asian king vulture, among the rarest of the vultures in India, remains yet to be recorded in the Sigur.

Meanwhile, the Egyptian vulture ( Neophron percnopterus), once widely seen in the Nilgiris, is not believed to have any nesting sites in the region, but is still occasionally spotted.

“Though the vulture population is comparatively much higher than in other parts of southern India, it is still very small. The breeding population is even smaller and the success rate for breeding pairs remains at only 70%,” says Mr. Byju. This highlights one of the reasons the population is yet to see any sizeable increase despite strict protections being enforced in the MTR and the surrounding areas against the use of NSAIDs.