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Vultures: the next dodos?

Learning objectives

Indian vultures are on the brink of extinction. You will piece together the evidence to find out why. Then you'll find a way to save them.

Try the activity

• Activity sheet
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• Teachers notes
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Curriculum link

11 - 14 (KS3)
Plants for food QCA 9d - at each step of a food chain persistent toxins are accumulated in carnivores; this process is bio-accumulation. Identify key points about a scientific issue and recognise that there is often a balance of advantage and disadvantage in development.

Environment and feeding relationships QCA 7c - food chains and webs

Running the activity

Suggested time 20-50 minutes.
You can do the activity more quickly by giving students the food web instead of asking them to construct it as a preliminary activity. You can extend the activity to occupy a full lesson by asking them to produce a written summary of their findings.

Starter
Display the picture on page 1 of vultures bending over freshly-picked bones. Ask questions like these: what do vultures eat? Do they have any predators? Why are they dying out?
Page 1 sets the scene with a dramatic photo of vultures eating. It can be printed onto transparency or projected. This page also sets the task.
Page 2 carries statements from a range of people affected by the decline in vulture numbers. It can be printed onto transparency or projected, but students will probably find it easier to work with paper copies.

Students should be able to construct a food web using the ecologist's account.
Using the web and the accounts of the other characters they should be able to explain the cause and effects of the vulture's decline.
Diclofenec, a cheap painkiller, is increasingly being prescribed to keep lame cattle on their feet. If they die soon afterwards, enough of the drug is left in their bodies to kill any vultures that feed on them. Even small amounts of diclofenec will accumulate in vulture's bodies. Vultures do a vital job in India. They clear the countryside of dead animal remains. They are also vital to the success of the Parsi "sky burial" ritual. Their demise means more food for packs of rabid wild dogs and more remains left to undergo a slower and smellier process of microbial decay.

Plenary
Groups of students could tell others in the class how they propose to save the vulture. Alternatively, they could find out how British cattle suspected of having BSE were disposed of when huge numbers of them had to be slaughtered at once.

Web links

News links

National Geographic

An easy to read summary of the current findings

New Scientist

A summary of the latest evidence that a veterinary drug retained by dead cattle may be causing kidney failure in vultures

National Geographic (archive)

An article from two years ago when the vulture decline was thought to be caused by a mystery virus.

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