Old World vulture

Old World vultures belong to the family Accipitridae.  This family also includes eagles, buzzards, kites, and hawks.

Old World vultures are not closely related to New World vultures and condors.  They do not share that group's good sense of smell. 

Both Old World and New World vultures are scavenging birds.  They feed mostly from carcasses of dead animals. Old World vultures find carcasses only by sight. Many vultures have a bald head, with no feathers or short down feathers.  Because of how a vulture eats, their head is spattered with blood and other fluids.  They are able to keep clean by not having long feathers on their head.

There are two groups of Old World vultures.  The first group has the Egyptian vulture, bearded vulture, and palm-nut vulture. Some scientists put this group into a separate subfamily called "Gypaetinae", which means "eagle-vultures". It is related to the group of bazas, honey-buzzards and cuckoo-hawks, which are much smaller birds.  The second group has all the other species.  It is related to the booted eagles, which is a group of eagles that have feathers on their legs down to their toes.  

The palm-nut vulture is unusual, because it feeds mainly on the fruit of the oil palm.  

 Species 

 Subfamily Gypaetinae 

Genus Gypaetus
 Lammergeier or bearded vulture, Gypaetus barbatus
Genus Neophron
 Egyptian vulture, Neophron percnopterus
Genus Gypohierax
 Palm-nut vulture, Gypohierax angolensis

 Subfamily Aegypiinae 

Genus Aegypius
 Cinereous vulture, Aegypius monachus
Genus Gyps
 Griffon vulture, Gyps fulvus
 White-rumped vulture, Gyps bengalensis
 Rüppell's vulture, Gyps rueppelli
 Indian vulture, Gyps indicus
 Slender-billed vulture, Gyps tenuirostris
 Himalayan vulture, Gyps himalayensis
 White-backed vulture, Gyps africanus
 Cape vulture, Gyps coprotheres
Genus Necrosyrtes
 Hooded vulture, Necrosyrtes monachus
Genus Sarcogyps
 Red-headed vulture, Sarcogyps calvus
Genus Torgos
 Lappet-faced vulture, Torgos tracheliotus
Genus Trigonoceps
 White-headed vulture, Trigonoceps occipitalis

Category:Vultures