| May 11th, 2008 |
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Vultures! Vultures everywhere!
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09:21 am
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As the latest sign of the importance of my neighborhood in the world's ecological system, for the past several days we have been visited by a flock of turkey vultures.
The turkey vulture is a most impressive, if somewhat vile (it feeds almost exclusively on carrion and defecates on its feet to control body temperature) bird, with a wingspan of six feet. We got a closeup look this morning as one perched on the porch just off our bedroom window.
This is the first time I've seen one in the twenty-seven years we've lived here. Yesterday's display impressed the most when fully twenty of them perched in the locust trees in back of our pool, mostly on the stumps of branches we had cut back last fall. It was positively Hitchcockian. Anna, Laura and I stood on our stair landing with the huge window overlooking the back yard. Occasionally one would fly right towards us, then swoop up and over the house.
It is, I believe, the first time our crows appeared humbled.
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