I've noticed that little attention is ever paid to vultures when they have essentially by-passed most, if not all of the challenges of the food chain. They have no natural predators. They don't have to struggle for survival because carrion is readily available and others animals can't eat it safely. We tend to think of other animals as higher in the food chain but in reality, vultures have it made for themselves. So who is king? they have no competitors or predators. No one wants to eat them nor does anyone want to eat (or can) what they do. They are totally free. How clever.
Many predators are at the top of their food chain. Big cats, raptors, bears, etc. What keeps them in check is their requirement for food and its veritable lack. Same goes for vultures. There are quite a few carrion-eaters. Eagles, hawks, bears, oppossum, coyotes, Komodo dragons, etc. Vultures merely have the greatest publicity, possibly because they have been driven into the hostile environment of the desert, where they have been popularized in films. Unfortunately, this is a peripheral ecology, on the edge of survival where it is difficult to find food.
We have a healthy population of vultures who nest in the cliffs just downriver from us. Are we including all of these under the rubric 'vultures'? Cathartes aura Cathartes burrovianus Cathartes melambrotus We also have eagles and coyotes who also eat carrion I ain't sure about the hawks and ospreys
