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Another continental vulture crisis : Africa’s vultures collapsing toward extinction

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Ogada_Shaw_et_al_2016_African_vulture_Cons_Letters.pdf (420.9Kb)
Date
26/04/2016
Author
Ogada, Darcy
Shaw, Philip
Beyers, Rene L
Buij, Ralph
Murn, Campbell
Thiollay, Jean Marc
Beale, Colin M
Holdo, Ricardo M
Pomeroy, Derek
Baker, Neil
Krüger, Sonja C
Botha, Andre
Virani, Munir Z
Monadjem, Ara
Sinclair, Anthony R E
Keywords
Asian vulture crisis
Poisoning
Scavenger
Vulture population decline
Illegal wildlife trade
Traditional medicine
Bushmeat
GE Environmental Sciences
QH301 Biology
QL Zoology
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Abstract
Vultures provide critical ecosystem services, yet populations of many species have collapsed worldwide. We present the first estimates of a 30-year Pan- African vulture decline, confirming that declines have occurred on a scale broadly comparable with those seen in Asia, where the ecological, economic, and human costs are already documented. Populations of eight species we assessed had declined by an average of 62%; seven had declined at a rate of 80% or more over three generations. Of these, at least six appear to qualify for uplisting to Critically Endangered. Africa’s vultures are facing a range of specific threats, the most significant of which are poisoning and trade in traditional medicines, which together accounted for 90% of reported deaths. We recommend that national governments urgently enact and enforce legislation to strictly regulate the sale and use of pesticides and poisons, to eliminate the illegal trade in vulture body parts, as food or medicine, and to minimize mortality caused by power lines and wind turbines.
Citation
Ogada , D , Shaw , P , Beyers , R L , Buij , R , Murn , C , Thiollay , J M , Beale , C M , Holdo , R M , Pomeroy , D , Baker , N , Krüger , S C , Botha , A , Virani , M Z , Monadjem , A & Sinclair , A R E 2016 , ' Another continental vulture crisis : Africa’s vultures collapsing toward extinction ' , Conservation Letters , vol. 9 , no. 2 , pp. 89-97 . https://doi.org/10.1111/conl.12182
Publication
Conservation Letters
Status
Peer reviewed
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1111/conl.12182
ISSN
1755-263X
Type
Journal article
Rights
© 2015 The Authors. Conservation Letters published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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  • University of St Andrews Research
URI
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/8817

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