Once dusk approaches, vulture activity shifts noticeably. During the day, vultures ride thermals, travel, and search for carrion. While the sun drops lower, the warm rising air begins to weaken. The birds often stop traveling far and begin moving toward a regular night roost.
Just before sunset, vultures may circle near the roost in loose groups. This circling can look like they are gathering over something dead, but that is not always the case. In the evening, they often use the last lift of the day, sorting themselves into the roost and waiting for a safe place to settle. One bird may arrive, then several more. They may circle, drift, perch, shift position, and lift off again before finally settling.
A roost may be in tall trees, cliffs, utility towers, old buildings, or other high open places. Vultures prefer places where they can see around them. In the morning, they launch easily. Roosting together provides some protection against danger. It may also help them keep track of where other vultures go to feed.
After dark, vultures are mostly quiet and inactive. They do not hunt at night. Their eyesight is good, but they need sunlight and warm air to soar. Without thermals, they conserve energy by perching. They may shift, preen, or shuffle along a branch, but mostly they rest at night.
Animals die at night. Their carcasses, if not swallowed whole, may be hastily shredded, abandoned, and left to rot as a meal for the buzzards or other scavengers.
Near sunrise, the roost stirs. Vultures stretch, preen, and spread their wings. Sunning in the morning is among their most noticeable behaviors. A vulture standing with open wings is usually warming after the cool nighttime, drying dew, and preparing for flight.
They usually wait for the sun to warm the ground and create rising air. When thermals form, vultures leave, circling upward and spreading out. The roost empties, and the search begins again.
The Scavengers
Fifty-seven buzzards, one on each of fifty-seven fence posts at the rancho El Tejon, on a mirage-breeding September morning, sat solemnly while the white tilted travelers’ vans lumbered down the Canada de los Uvas. After three hours they had only clapped their wings, or exchanged posts. The season’s end in the vast dim valley of the San Joaquin is palpitatingly hot, and the air breathes like cotton wool. Through it all the buzzards sit on the fences and low hummocks, with wings spread fanwise for air. There is no end to them, and they smell to heaven. Their heads droop, and all their communication is a rare, horrid croak.
Mary Hunter-Austin – Land of Little Rain
