Alarm over more vulture poisonings

More than 100 vultures died at a private game reserve near Kruger Park's southern boundary

- Sheree Bega

More than 100 critically endangered vultures have died in the latest mass poisoning, this time in a private game reserve near the southern boundary of Kruger National Park in Mpumalanga.

The toll includes 92 white-backed vultures, 90% of which were breeding adults, nine hooded vultures as well as one male adult white-headed bird.

Earlier this month, more than 120 vultures died in Kruger after ingesting the carcass of an elephant that poachers had laced with poison, while a further 84 were successfully rescued by SANParks and the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT).

The latest poisoning, in Marloth Park's Lionspruit Game Reserve, was located through real-time GPS tracking of several vultures, which had previously been rehabilitated and released by vulture conservation organisation Vulpro and the Wild and Free Rehabilitation Centre in Hectorspruit.

On detecting abnormal movement, Vulpro notified Wild and Free, which then contacted Nkomazi municipal field rangers. The team responded immediately to find a "catastrophic scene" with multiple dead birds lying around a warthog carcass.

There are no survivors and no body parts were taken. Two more carcasses were discovered by air, thanks to SANParks, which had joined the search. The carcasses were found on Sunday and were a "direct hit on vultures", said Vulpro's chief executive Kerri Wolter.

"It's been a nightmare. It definitely wasn't a fresh scene. What happens with tracking [during] breeding season, you've got to give vultures at least 24 hours to 36 hours to see if they're going to move or not."

Sometimes, depending on the weather, the birds will roost on a tree for a day or they will incubate their eggs if it's breeding season, she said.

"You tend to give it a little bit of time otherwise you feel like you're crying wolf the whole time. That's why we waited.