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Carrion Ecology and Management pp 213–240Cite as

What Makes Carrion Unsafe for Scavengers? Considerations for Appropriate Regulatory Policies and Sound Management Practices

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Part of the book series: Wildlife Research Monographs ((WIREMO,volume 2))

Abstract

Carrion is rarely managed as a food resource, and there is an acute lack of awareness about its importance to a host of scavenging species. While availability of carrion is a serious problem for some populations of scavengers, its decreasing quality is a global issue that has decimated others, and contaminated food webs. We now know that carrion is widely tainted with veterinary agents, among them antibiotics and the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, or NSAIDs, which are used to treat livestock. Numerous antimicrobial agents have been found to negatively affect micro-scavengers such as coprophagous beetles. Carrion is also frequently used as a poisoning conduit—in particular, being laced with highly toxic organophosphorus and carbamate pesticides to kill predators such as lions, wolves, eagles and hyenas. Secondary poisoning following the consumption of rodenticide or organophosphate pesticide residues in pest species has also severely harmed scavenger populations. Presence of heavy metals—primarily lead, in the carcasses of animals killed by hunters using lead ammunition—has devastated populations of the Critically Endangered California Condor, via both lethal and sub-lethal effects. Carrion must be managed in concert with the ecosystem services that scavengers provide, and to benefit biodiversity. Regulatory policies aimed at controlling the quantity or quality of carrion have had both negative and positive effects on scavengers. Supplementary feeding stations may bolster vulture populations, but they must ensure both the intrinsic safety and quality of carrion available to scavengers. We outline the factors that make carrion unsafe to scavengers, especially obligate feeders such as vultures, and offer recommendations and guidelines for further research, appropriate regulatory policies, and vigilant management practices to properly safeguard scavengers from carrion—a resource still largely perceived to be benign.

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Acknowledgements

SB thanks Dr. Todd Katzner for his helpful review. We appreciate all those working to protect our vultures and scavengers, whether through research or careful policy-making.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Peregrine Fund, Boise, ID, USA

    Darcy Ogada

  2. National Museums of Kenya, Nairobi, Kenya

    Darcy Ogada

  3. Working Dogs for Conservation (WD4C), Bozeman, MT, USA

    Ngaio Richards

  4. Division of Forestry and Natural Resources, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV, USA

    Shannon Behmke

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  1. Darcy Ogada
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  2. Ngaio Richards
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  3. Shannon Behmke
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Darcy Ogada .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Centro de Investigación en Biodiversidad y Cambio Global (CIBC-UAM), Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Pedro P. Olea

  2. Centre for Functional Ecology (CFE), Department of Life Sciences, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal

    Patricia Mateo-Tomás

  3. Departamento de Biología Aplicada, Universidad Miguel Hernández, Elche, Spain

    José Antonio Sánchez-Zapata

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Ogada, D., Richards, N., Behmke, S. (2019). What Makes Carrion Unsafe for Scavengers? Considerations for Appropriate Regulatory Policies and Sound Management Practices. In: Olea, P., Mateo-Tomás, P., Sánchez-Zapata, J. (eds) Carrion Ecology and Management. Wildlife Research Monographs, vol 2. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-16501-7_9

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