went into a bar, and the first one…
No sorry – actually I had the opportunity to draw three beautiful vultures with Wild Life Drawing and Gauntlet Birds of Prey which is a conservation and education falconry centre based in Knutsford. I haven’t ever clocked how different a vulture is from say an eagle or other raptor, but they are exquisitely adapted for their niche, which is as a clear-up and clean-up service over the grasslands and mountains across the middle latitudes, although we don’t have them here in Britain as they require carrion in quantity, plus our climate is a bit wet and windy for vultures. They have a stomach pH of 0.25 so basically like battery acid, and this neutralises and digests not only sinew and bone but also bacteria and viruses such as anthrax and Ebola, meaning they provide an essential break in disease cycles for both livestock and wildlife.
Old World vultures are across Europe, Asia and Africa, and are descended from hawks and eagles. New World vultures are in the Americas and are descended from cranes and storks. Convergent evolution means they look and behave in a way which is virtually identical but they actually have different ancestral roots. There is one way to distinguish them: New World vultures tend to have feathered necks, and lose excess heat by urinating on their legs (apologies – just giving you the facts) whereas the Old World species have bald patches and light down on their necks to serve the same purpose.
Here are my sketches. I drew the large portrait and the flying one from the reference images, but the rest are from the livestream. The birds were each given a beef rib to chow down on so we could get a good look at them. They all have different shapes and beaks – a bit like waders, so they can all feed at the same time. They are very sociable, but also have a strong sense of hierarchy as some birds are bigger and feed first, before the birds with smaller beaks go in and pick up the smaller morsels. Vultures are obviously also reliant on the mammalian predators to bring down, dispatch and deploy sharp teeth to break into the carcass.
Populations have declined dramatically and Gauntlet Birds of Prey are part of a programme involved with licensed breeding, reintroducing, rescuing and monitoring these fabulous birds.
I really enjoyed the livestream and watching the birds, as well as scribbling down rough sketches as they hopped about. This is my Venezia sketchbook, with my Blackwing pencil and some brown ink in my Pilot Parallel pen, oh and some dots of red ink for the meaty bones and green ink for the lettering.
