Vultures will improve nature tourism in Iğdır, gleaning the carcasses littered.

The first Vulture Restaurant in Turkey was opened in Iğdır Green Zone City Forest in cooperation with the Ministry of Environment and Forestry Iğdır City Environment and Forest Directorate and KuzeyDoğa Society. Butcher leftovers and animal carcasses that will be decanted at the appropriate area, distant from the settlements and near Aras and Arpaçay Canyons where the vultures breed and are under the restriction of the Ministry, will either be a natural nourishment for the vultures facing the menace of extinction or attract the nature tourists that will frequent the area to spot the vultures.

The fact that the inauguration of Turkey’s first Vulture Restaurant corresponds to 2009 World Birdwatching Day created an extra excitement for the nature-lovers and birdwatchers that had been around Iğdır City Forest for Kars-Iğdır Nature Festival. Breeding around Arpaçay and Aras canyons, the Egyptian vultures (Neophron percnopterus) whose species are in peril of extinction and two steppe eagles (Aquila nipalensis) feeding with the discarded carcasses animated the birdwatchers. Being present there for making a documentary movie for the activities of KuzeyDoğa Society, IZ TV filmed the inauguration of the vulture restaurant.

Yaşar Türkleş, the Ministry of Environment and Forestry Nature Conservation and National Parks (DKMP) Wildlife Department Director, who has visited the vulture restaurant in company with Taner Tazegün, director of Iğdır Environment and Forestry Directorate; and Cemal Akcan, DKMP Wildlife Management Branch Director; said that they were pleased with the realization of such initiative for Turkey’s wildlife, and underlined that the required support would be made available.

At the time of the inauguration, Dr. Çağan Şekercioğlu, KuzeyDoğa Society President and senior research biologist at Stanford University, highlighted the following facts:

“This area that accommodates the highest number of Turkey’s 4 vulture species (Egyptian, bearded, griffon and black vultures) around the valleys of Aras and Arpaçay is the best suitable spot, for the first time in Turkey, to set up the vulture restaurants that have been operative in many countries such as South Africa and Mexico for years. A secret hide will be planted for the tourists that will be visiting the area to gaze at and photograph the vultures and other predators to be attracted by the carcasses left. We see here in Iğdır some similarities to the documentaries filmed in Africa. Nature tours from Turkey to the Bulgarian vulture restaurant are organized and these events provide them with foreign currency. However, Eastern Anatolia embraces greater number of vultures and it is possible that nature tourism make an important source of income for Eastern Anatolia. We have been continuously keeping the records of Turkey’s four vulture species around this region during our observations. It is necessary in Iğdır to establish a Vulture Restaurant, to gather the corpses of animals found car- crashed and death on the roads (like horses, donkeys, dogs, boars etc.), to deposit on the area, and to introduce this area to wildlife photographers. This is at the same time the first vulture restaurant with the view of the Mt. Ağrı (Ararat) in the world.

KuzeyDoğa Society conducted pilot works regarding this subject in the previous years. We have documented the carcasses that we had left on the bank of the Aras River, Tekealtı Mountain and Tuzluca Dumpsite were gleaned by dozens of all kinds of vultures. Iğdır is a very ideal spot for the first vulture restaurant. Such an initiative will make our city an important nature tourism center and the agenda of the foreigners, will promote the economy, and will demonstrate Turkey’s nature conservation sensibility regarding nourishment of the vultures that are about to be extinct. Area within Iğdır Green Zone Taner Tazegün, Iğdır Environment and Forest City Director, and I ascertained for the project is fairly suitable for the vultures. We hope that the vultures will get used to the habitat in a short time. Later on, making use of a bird-watching shed that will be erected in Green Zone City Forest; all nature lovers, primarily people of Iğdır, will be able to observe the vultures closely in this area.
 
Vultures are nature’s scavengers and they are of a very valuable utilization on ecological grounds, but the vulture species are in a grave danger throughout the world. Some of the medications used in veterinary medicine cause a kidney collapse in the vultures that plunder the carcasses of the animals on which the medications are used. For example, number of the population of vultures in India became 100 times less due to such medications. Since we are apprehensive about suffering the same crisis in Turkey, Vulture Restaurant provides the vultures with a source of food that is free of chemicals. Because lead poisons vultures, they are to be nurtured by the animal carcasses shot by copper bullets. The fact that lead has noxious impact on either humans or animals impels some countries to regulate copper bullets in hunting. It will be very effective in our country if it starts using copper bullets to avoid polluting man and nature since lead is very detrimental for health and, regardless of how thoroughly cleaned, games may contain lead residues. Even these residues that are so minuscule that it is impossible to see by eyes are quite toxic for human health.

Vultures make up the ultimate link of the chain of birds’ ecological function. They prevent scattering of saprophytic bacteria and microorganisms to the ambiance, by consuming the living things that have deceased and in progress of decomposition. Vultures can make 400-500 kilometers of distance in search of carcasses and, while doing this; they generally glide making use of hot airflows and not consuming much energy. Another reason for the vulture to go in such long distances is that they have a wingspan of almost 3 meters. The most eye-catching answering example of the question, “What would happen if vultures are not extant?” can be obtained from India. Diclofenac, a painkiller used in the treatment of cattle in India, caused the collapse of the vultures’ kidneys that had fed themselves with such cattle’s carcasses, which ultimately gave a birth to the 95 % or 99 % dwindling of the most pandemic vulture species. In consequence of the decline in the number of vultures, carcasses of the cattle were here and there getting rotten, and the number of the stray dogs that fed with them increased by 20 in various areas. Majority of the fatalities due to rabies appears in India. It has been measured that the extinction of the vultures caused 50,000 superfluous deaths of rabies until 2006 in India. In addition, extinction of vultures has inflicted a spiritual crisis to the Persian Zarathustra sectarians who abandon the deceased body of their relatives or kinsmen for the vultures. Presently, there are vulture restaurants in India for the sake of providing these predators with the required nourishment. They aim at increasing the number of vultures in this fashion.

Even though most imperative motive to create vulture restaurants is to sustain the vulture race, birdwatchers, nature photographers and nature lovers who may stopover at these restaurants will add value to the area on economic grounds via nature tourism. Such that some countries like Bulgaria, Mexico, South Africa, Nepal and Spain supply incomes from these activities and make them into an industry.“