Keeping an eye out for turkey vultures

Elizabeth Wommack, curator and collections manager of vertebrates for the University of Wyoming Museum of Vertebrates at the Berry Biodiversity Conservation Center, is fascinated by these large birds, but details about them in Wyoming are mostly unknown.

“They are common in Wyoming, yet we don’t’ know much about them,” Wommack said. “Turkey vultures are a wide-ranging species across the state. They may travel hundreds of miles per day, which makes them hard to study.”

The museum teams up with UW’s Biodiversity Institute to kick off Vulture Watch Wyoming, a new program for citizen scientists across the state.

Vulture Watch Wyoming invites community members to share their observations of these fascinating birds. A training session is from 10 a.m.-noon Saturday, April 27, at the UW Berry Biodiversity Conservation Center auditorium and it will be livestreamed via Zoom for those who can’t be there in person.

After the training, volunteers report their vulture sightings using a special survey app that provides questions for the observer to answer. These include information on what the vulture is doing, such as roosting, soaring or feeding. If it is roosting, information on the roost location is documented.

“There is much to learn about roost dynamics, breeding behavior and how they interact with their habitat,” Wommack said. “Whether you spend a few minutes observing their communal roost, watch them soar or you find roost sites, the reported observations help researchers at the University of Wyoming Museum of Vertebrates and the Biodiversity Institute build a better picture of where these important birds are found in Wyoming.”

Laramie residents need not go far to observe a large vulture roost where these birds gather at dusk. They spend the night in a group slumber party before heading back out to search for food the next day.

Vultures gather in Laramie every April after migrating from wintering grounds in Central America and South America. The roost, that has been present for many years, is south of Old Main in the southwest corner of the University of Wyoming campus. It is accessed from 9th or 10th streets and East Ivinson Avenue.

Wommack said the birds already arrived from their wintering grounds. The best time to observe the roost is from 6-8 a.m., and when the birds return after a day of scavenging from about 6:30 p.m. to sunset.

“Last year, I counted between 40 to 50 birds during the spring and summer,” Wommack said. “It bumped up to around 80 birds in the fall.”

Turkey vultures are relatively easily to spot when soaring on thermals, often in groups called kettles. They hold their wings in a “V” above their backs. Golden eagles, by comparison, have a more linear wing profile.

The turkey vulture is the only vulture with a sense of smell. In other areas where it overlaps with black vultures, the later species often follow the turkey vultures to locate carrion, since the black vultures lack that keen sense of smell.

Turkey vultures with the feather-free red head are commonly spotted on roadkill along highways, pecking at the carcass. The bare head allows them to reach inside the carcass and peck it clean. They can feast on such fare even when it’s infested with deadly bacteria. Vultures have powerful stomach acid that destroys nasty diseases such as rabies, botulism, distemper and anthrax. In fact, this ability helps prevent the spread of the diseases.

“The genus of turkey vultures is ‘Cathartes,’” Wommack said. “That means ‘purifier’ in Greek and that is just what they do. They help clean up and purify the landscape. They are an important species, and we could use some help finding out more about them.”