In 2010 the RSPB started working with our Bulgarian partner BSPB on the Egyptian Vulture population that was in freefall back then. Between the 1980s and 2012 the Balkan population had plummeted from >600 pairs to only around 60 pairs.
Ringing an Egyptian Vulture chick with Volen Arkumarev and Ivailo Angelov from BSPB © S. Spasov
Through an ambitious conservation project (2012 to 2016) we first tried to understand the causes of the decline and improve the productivity and survival of Egyptian Vultures on their breeding grounds in Bulgaria and Greece. Hundreds of electricity poles were insulated to reduce electrocution, vulture feeding areas were established, and nests were guarded to prevent poaching. However, we realised that the challenges were larger than anything that could be solved at the level of a single country.
After years of tracking Egyptian Vultures with satellite transmitters, we had a very good idea of their migratory journeys – including the places where they die on migration. An even more ambitious conservation project followed – from 2016 to 2022 we worked with 22 partner organisations across 14 countries from the Balkans through the Middle East to Africa to reduce the threats to migratory raptors along the entire flyway.
A juvenile Egyptian Vulture that has successfully migrated to Ethiopia © S. Zelleke
The threats to migratory raptors are common and widespread – birds get electrocuted at poorly designed power infrastructure, they get accidentally poisoned when people try to protect their livestock from predators, and they get persecuted either for fun or for the trade in vulture products for belief-based use.
After 6 years of hard work along the flyway – dealing with some significant setbacks such as a global pandemic and civil wars that prevented much needed work – the project finally finished at the end of December 2022. Through powerline retrofitting we reduced the electrocution rate in focal project areas in Jordan and Turkey to 0. Through outreach and engagement work we reduced the availability of vulture products on markets in Niger and Nigeria by >80%, and reduced the number of reported poisoning incidents in the Balkan project areas by 50%.
Number of breeding Egyptian Vultures in the Balkans (Bulgaria, Greece, Albania, North Macedonia) since 2006. The vertical line marks the start of the flyway LIFE project.
Although many threats persist along the flyway for migratory raptors, we seem to have turned the tide for the Egyptian Vulture population in the Balkans: the population has stabilised at around 55 pairs, the survival of juvenile birds has improved, and even adult birds now face a slightly lower risk of mortality. The breeding productivity is among the highest in Europe, and a captive breeding facility in Bulgaria is helping to reinforce the population until threats are further reduced.
Number of wintering Egyptian Vultures in Oromia and Afar (Ethiopia) since December 2009
During the very last days of the project our colleagues in Ethiopia counted Egyptian Vultures on wintering grounds in the desert of Afar. They found around 300 more Egyptian Vultures roosting on safe power pylons than we had counted in any of the previous years. Unfortunately, the number of dangerous power poles that cause electrocution is also increasing as Ethiopia is pursuing its national electrification plan. But hopefully our project has demonstrated that our interventions can contribute to huge benefits, and thus paves the way for national governments to apply the same actions at the much broader scale at which they are needed.
Ornithologists in Ethiopia (Alazar Ruffo, Ahmed Endris, Solomon Mengistu) counting wintering Egyptian Vultures © S. Zelleke
Egyptian Vultures roosting on transmission pylons in Ethiopia © S. Zelleke
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What an amazing project with fantastic results. Let's hope the Ethiopian Government heeds the advice and other governments where this is relevant too