Black vultures

The black vulture (Coragyps atratus), also known as the American black vulture, is a bird in the New World vulture family whose range extends from the southeastern United States to Central Chile and Uruguay in South America. Although a common and widespread species, it has a somewhat more restricted distribution than its compatriot, the turkey vulture, which breeds well into Canada and south to Tierra del Fuego. It is the only extant member of the genus Coragyps, which is in the family Cathartidae. Despite the similar name and appearance, this species is unrelated to the Eurasian black vulture, an Old World vulture in the family Accipitridae (which includes eagles, hawks, kites, and harriers). It inhabits relatively open areas which provide scattered forests or shrublands. With a wingspan of 1.5 m (4.9 ft), the black vulture is a large bird though relatively small for a vulture. It has black plumage, a featherless, grayish-black head and neck, and a short, hooked beak. The black vulture is a scavenger and feeds on carrion, but will also eat eggs or kill newborn animals. In areas populated by humans, it also feeds at garbage dumps. It finds its meals either by using its keen eyesight or by following other (New World) vultures, which possess a keen sense of smell. Lacking a syrinx—the vocal organ of birds—its only vocalizations are grunts or low hisses. It lays its eggs in caves or hollow trees or on the bare ground, and generally raises two chicks each year, which it feeds by regurgitation. In the United States, the vulture receives legal protection under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918. This vulture also appeared in Mayan codices. American naturalist William Bartram wrote of the black vulture in his 1792 book Bartram's Travels, calling it Vultur atratus 'black vulture' or 'carrion crow'. German ornithologist Johann Matthäus Bechstein formally described it using this name in 1793. The common name 'vulture' is derived from the Latin word vulturus, which means 'tearer' and is a reference to its feeding habits. The species name, ātrātus, means 'clothed in black,' from the Latin āter 'dull black'. Veillot defined the genus Catharista in 1816, listing as its type C. urubu. French naturalist Emmanuel Le Maout placed in its current genus Coragyps (as C. urubu) in 1853. Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire has been listed as the author in the past, but he did not publish any official description. The genus name means 'raven-vulture', from a contraction of the Greek corax/κόραξ and gyps/γὺψ for the respective birds. The American Ornithologists' Union used the name Catharista atrata initially, before adopting Veillot's name (Catharista urubu) in their third edition. By their fourth edition, they had adopted the current name. The black vulture is basal (the earliest offshoot) to a lineage that gave rise to the turkey and greater and lesser yellow-headed vultures, diverging around 12 million years ago. Martin Lichtenstein described C. a. foetens, the Andean black vulture, in 1817, and Charles Lucien Bonaparte described C. a. brasiliensis, from Central and South America, in 1850 on the basis of smaller size and minor plumage differences. However it has been established that the change between the three subspecies is clinal (that is, there is no division between the subspecies), and hence they are no longer recognised.