Griffon Vulture

Eagle is the only bird that can look directly into the Sun without any consequences, therefore is known as the King of Heaven.

With its magnificent wings manages the flight with no fatigue. With a keen sight, large and strong wings looks like a sky ruler. In Egyptian mythology the goddess Moot was believed to take the form of an eagle. Also the supreme goddess Isis and her son Horus were always represented by the wings of vultures.

On the Balkan Peninsula the griffon vulture is considered to be equally as impressive as the eagle. It is therefore not surprising that this bird is one of the most commonly used symbol in heraldry. Not proven, but it is believed that the symbol of eagle on Serbian flag and coat of arms is Griffon Vulture (Gyps fulvus) , White-headed sup (Beloglavi sup), or Kraguj.

This unique bird has a wing span of over 3 meters. It can rich a height of 3000 meters by catching warm air current and covers long distances in its search for food. It feeds predominantly dead stockpiles and other large mammals. It has a great role of nature purifier and preventing the onset of infection. Vulture lays one egg in a little nest on the cliff which hatched after 54 days and young birds remains there for up to 150 days.

In the early nineties of the last century in the most famous habitat at canyon Uvac in Serbia, only 7 pairs of vultures remained due to poisoning of pests and lack of food. Thanks to the protection measures of constant implementing the nutritive program, more than 100 tones of food annually, the number increased to about 500 individuals.

But few days ago I heard on the news that this rare and beautiful bird is facing complete extinction again.
It really motivated me to write down something about this bird in hope that there be more people protecting the perfection of nature.

By Jasminka S.

Photo from Pexel and Wikipedia.