Islamabad:The survival of endangered vulture species is a must to avoid imbalance in ecological settings that are already threatened by increasing human interventions.
When the vultures are no more in the ecosystem then their role or service ends and it is taken by other scavenger animals and birds, hence the population of dogs, kites and crows flourishes while disrupting the balance of the ecosystem. The government is quite optimistic as population of vultures has shown some ‘positive signs’ but it still accounts to only 10 percent as compared to their total population till mid 90s.
The record of the Red Data Book being compiled by the climate change ministry revealed that there are some 600 vultures especially Egyptian vultures in Nagarparkar, Cholistan and Thar areas. Pakistan is home to eight species of vultures but majority of vultures found here are Egyptian vultures, followed by long-billed, white-rumped, and red-headed vultures.
A Vulture Restoration Centre set up in Changa Manga is also making efforts to increase population of vultures. Currently, it is taking care of some 22 vultures that are being kept under safe but restricted environment. An official informed that the government imposed ban on sale of Diclofenac that was blamed for deaths of a large number of vultures. “In experiments, captive vultures died after feeding on tissues of domestic animals that had received a normal veterinary dose of the Diclofenac a few hours before death,” he said.
