Page "White-rumped Vulture" Paragraph 14

This species, as well as the Indian Vulture and Slender-billed Vulture has suffered a 99 percent population decrease in India and nearby countries since the early 1990s.

The decline has been widely attributed to poisoning by diclofenac, which is used as veterinary non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug ( NSAID ), leaving traces in cattle carcasses which when fed on leads to kidney failure in birds.

Diclofenac was also found to be lethal at low dosages to other species in the genus Gyps.

Other NSAIDs were also found to be toxic, to Gyps as well as other birds such as storks.

It was shown between 2000-2007 annual decline rates in India averaged 43. 9 % and ranged from 11-61 % in Punjab.

Organochlorine pesticide residues were found from egg and tissue samples from around India varying in concentrations from 0. 002 μg / g of DDE in muscles of vulture from Mudumalai to 7. 30 μg / g in liver samples from vultures of Delhi.

Dieldrin varied from 0. 003 and 0. 015 μg / g.

Higher concentrations were found in Lucknow.

These pesticide levels have not however been implicated in the decline.

An alternate hypothesis is an epidemic of avian malaria, as implicated in the extinctions of birds in the Hawaiian islands.

Evidence for the idea is drawn from an apparent recovery of a vulture following chloroquine treatment.

Yet another suggestion has been that the population changes may be linked with long term climatic cycles such as the El Niño – Southern Oscillation.