Watching Vultures Around Munsiyari

Vultures are nature’s clean-up artists, engineered to devour dead and decaying meat before it can build up pathogens that harm other animals in an ecosystem. Aside from their role as master scavengers, vultures are awe-inspiring birds. I have been deeply enamoured with vultures since I first spent time in the company of Indian long-billed vultures and Egyptian vultures around the Ramadevarabetta Vulture Sanctuary in Karnataka in 2014. As I learnt more about these fascinating birds, I yearned to see two vultures, the majestic Himalayan griffon (Gyps himalayensis) and the bearded vulture (Gypaetus barbatus). In 2022, I got my chance to spot them in the quaint, high-altitude town of Munsiyari, Uttarakhand. With an altitude ranging from 2,200 m to 3,700 m, the steep cliffs, boulder-strewn grasslands, and strong winds make it perfect for vulture-watching.

On my slow drive into Munsiyari, a thick mist engulfed the entire region, ensuring I would not see the town until the next day. On one of many stops in the dense fog, we explored a steep cliffside for any signs of life in the vast foggy white. A strong breeze pushed the fog upwards against the mountain face like a waterfall going the wrong way. That’s when I saw a large shape floating effortlessly through the mist. Its dark diamond-shaped tail, brilliant, orange-shaded body, and surreal wizard-like head stood out against the fog. It was the enigmatic bearded vulture.

Ritual Body Art

Bearded vultures get their common name from the black bristles protruding downward from their beak, like a beard. They engage in an incredible form of aesthetic self-styling or body painting called ochre bathing. Their head and body feathers are naturally white. Some bearded vultures seek out and bathe in waterbodies rich in iron oxide (from red soil). After dipping themselves in mineral-rich water or moist red ochre soil, the vultures use their beaks to spread the colour all over their bodies. A 2019 study entitled “Cosmetic Colouring by Bearded Vultures Gypaetus barbatus: still no evidence for an anti-bacterial function” found that the ochre bathing did not have any direct physiological advantages. Soil-stained feathers were just as susceptible to bacterial infections and orange individuals demonstrated the same breeding success (number of offspring) as pale individuals.

Red soil patches moistened by mountain streams are an uncommon occurrence. The study proposes that the time and effort a vulture puts into finding these primarily cosmetic baths is to gain social advantage — a way of showing off. For a bearded vulture to find a somewhat rare natural feature and bathe in it for the colouration would signal to members of its species that the individual is both familiar with the territory and possesses enough food and resources to spend afternoons painting their feathers orange. The hypothesis is that the more orange the bearded vulture, the greater its status within the species — not unlike the plot of many facial cream commercials!

Though the bearded vulture has been around for millions of years, it is sparsely distributed in Africa, Europe, and Asia. Across this vast expanse of space and time, these bone-dining scavengers have likely had many interactions with humans and the carcasses of animals hunted by humans. In a captivating paper entitled “Ochre Bathing of the Bearded Vulture: A Bio-Mimetic Model for Early Humans Towards Smell Prevention and Health”, the author Helmut Tributsch draws out geographic and time-based parallels in the adoption of ochre bathing by bearded vultures and the use of ochre as body paint and in death rituals in humans. Ochre painting in humans is thought to be at least 200,000 years old, and some indigenous communities, such as the Himba of Namibia, continue to use ochre to paint their bodies ritualistically. The author proposes that the original inspiration to use ochre on our bodies may have come from watching bearded vultures. The anti-bacterial benefits of ochre mud to human skin may have encouraged early humans’ continued use of ochre.

The Bone Breaker

Bearded vultures are also called lammergeiers (German “lamb vulture”) because they were considered strong enough to carry sheep away. Their non-scientific Latin name, ossifraga (“bone breaker”), more accurately represents their extraordinary dietary habits. Between 70-90 per cent of their diet consists of the bones of deceased animals. They are known to prefer large bones like the leg bones of sheep and usually swallow them whole. When a bone is too large to be directly gulped down, bearded vultures carry it up to 80 m in the sky and drop it onto a rock to crack it into easily swallowable pieces. They can comfortably digest large bones within 24 hours. Bones are an excellent source of nutrition. The fatty marrow inside provides them energy, and the hard bone provides about 25-35 per cent of its weight in protein. On a morning stroll around Munsiyari, I had the pleasure of seeing a bearded vulture carry a large bone into the valley. Unfortunately, it chose to break and consume it well out of my sight.

Incredible wingspan

Munsiyari is filled with breathtaking sights. For instance, the towering Himalayas dominate the eastern sky, and the sky above is generously filled with gliding Himalayan griffons. Found largely around the high-altitude regions of the Himalayas, the Himalayan griffon is a massive bird. Wing tip to wing tip, griffons measure between 8-10 feet (3 m)! For perspective, basketball superstar Shaquille O’Neal, with outstretched arms, would measure only about 7.5 feet. These large wings make flight possible for a bird that weighs as much as a small dog (up to 12 kg). The enormous wings produce enough lift, pushing against the wing) for the bird to take off. Once the hefty bird has taken off, it almost entirely relies on the upward movement of air to carry it to soaring height.

As we watched griffons soar up on thermal updrafts, I wondered how they managed to glide with so much grace and efficiency. While the large wing area enables take-off, the enormous width (top to bottom) causes a bunch of non-glide-friendly things for the griffon — such as excess drag and dangerous amounts of turbulence around the wing, called flow separation.

Unsurprisingly, evolution is an adept aeronautical engineer. While watching soaring griffons from Khaliya Point (the highest point in Munsiyari), I noticed them spread out their primary feathers. With feathers spread out slightly, the vultures still generate enough lift to keep them in the air, but minimize turbulence around the wing. In addition, the upward bend of their wingtips further reduces unwanted drag and improves lift, while the birds are soaring. These remarkable techniques are used in most modern aeroplanes to improve flight efficiency. Humans learnt a lot about flying from observing birds intensely. It was not lost on me, however, that contemplating the effects of wind resistance on a vulture while sitting on a serene mountaintop may be the reason I am not invited to parties anymore.

Sharp-dressed scavengers

When Himalayan griffons are not demonstrating their mastery of aerodynamics, I saw them perched, showing off how gorgeously stylish-looking they are, giving me a sense of being underdressed. The mighty Himalayan griffon wears a thick, feathery beige and brown coat. It tucks its long throat beneath a fluffy white neck scarf of feathers. The long throat or crop acts as a nifty space for food storage, which is particularly useful when the griffon carries food to its young. Himalayan griffons mostly consume carrion, typically from the carcasses of large mammals like yak or sheep. Every morning in Munsiyari, I see at least a handful of these massive birds scanning the landscape for signs of carrion.

With more vulture encounters than I could have asked for, Munsiyari deepened my love for these enigmatic sky wanderers and etched many wonderful vulture-shaped memories into my heart. In their company, I felt inspired to learn more about their imaginative body art and decode their masterful flight.