ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY BULLETIN 



U 



EVERY BRANCH TREMBLES WITH THE WEIGHT OF VULTURES 

 An Adjutant is Perched on a Bough in the Center Picture 



THE SCAVENGER BIRDS OF 



Bfi C. William Beebe 

 Curator of Birds 



INDIA 



We who enjoy the comforts of Western civili- 

 zation, seldom give a thought to the perfection 

 of operation and concealment of our vast sani- 

 tary and other systems. Occasionally the intri- 

 cate lines of sewers, the mighty water-pipes, the 

 mesh-work of electric wiring are laid bare in 

 our streets ; all that necessary subterranean 

 plexus which makes life pleasant or possible in 

 our great cities. But to realize that there are 

 lands where, between scores of millions of human 

 beings and the most dread diseases due to un- 

 sanitary conditions, are bulwarks only of hosts 

 of feathered beings, great and small, is a new 

 thought, and one which should abate every feel- 

 ing except of interest and appreciation. 



Even before one's steamer comes within sight 

 of the low marshy shoreline of India, there is 

 evidence of the bird scavengers of that country. 

 Hardly have the propellers begun to churn up 

 the muddy water of the Hoogly, many miles 

 from land, than gulls of several species come 

 screaming toward the vessel and from thence 



onward every port-hole, every motion of the 

 passengers is kept under surveillance, until a 

 stray bit of bread or other refuse draws the 

 flock downward in swift spirals to the water. 



Gulls in this role are familiar even in our 

 New York harbor, but when we enter the Hoogly 

 itself a new element is introduced, the kite — the 

 Brahminy kites with their long graceful wings 

 and deep cleft tail, clad in strongly contrasting 

 hues of white and rich chestnut, and the less 

 conspicuous brown pariah kites of the city itself. 

 These birds are adapted both in swift flight and 

 grasp of talons for a life of pursuit and capture 

 of living creatures, but they have chosen the 

 easier method of livelihood in this land teeming 

 with mankind, of subsisting upon refuse. Our 

 country is not without a parallel, for along the 



" These notes were made chiefly in the vicinity of Calcutta 

 and Rangoon. The birds mentioned are the following: — Brown- 

 headed Gull — Larus brunncicephalus ; Brahminy Kite — Haliastur 

 indus; Pariah Kite — Milvus govinda; House Crows — Corvus 

 splendens and Lnsolans ; Jungle Crow — Corvus macorhynchus ; 

 White-backed Vulture — Pseudogyps bengalensis ; Adjutant — 

 Leptoptilus dubius. 



HUNDRED VULTURES FLAP TO THE FEAST 



A STRUGGLING Pll E OF BIRDS 



