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The turkey vulture (Cathartes aura) is the most widespread of the New World vultures. [2] One of three species in the genus Cathartes of the family Cathartidae, the turkey vulture ranges from southern Canada to the southernmost tip of South America. It inhabits a variety of open and semi-open areas, including subtropical forests, shrublands ...
Turkey vulture, [6] Cathartes aura (Greek katartes, "purifier", aura, from Latin aurum, "gold"), can be described as large brownish-black vultures with two-toned colors on the underside of their wings. Grown adults will have a red head. There are three other subspecies of turkey vulture located throughout North and Central America.
Black vulture: Cathartidae: Coragyps atratus (Bechstein, 1793) 4 Turkey vulture: Cathartidae: Cathartes aura (Linnaeus, 1758) 5 Lesser yellow-headed vulture: Cathartidae: Cathartes burrovianus Cassin, 1845: 6 Greater yellow-headed vulture: Cathartidae: Cathartes melambrotus Wetmore, 1964: 7 Secretarybird: Sagittariidae: Sagittarius serpentarius ...
The turkey vulture, Cathartes aura, also known in North America as the turkey buzzard, is a bird found throughout most of the Americas. One of three species in the genus Cathartes, in the family Cathartidae, it is the most common of the New World vultures, ranging from southern Canada to the southernmost tip of South America. It inhabits a ...
Species C. aura (Linnaeus, 1758); C. burrovianus Cassin, 1845; C. melambrotus Wetmore, 1964; Approximate distribution of the genus Cathartes.Green indicates that at least one species is resident year-round and yellow shows areas where one species, the turkey vulture, is a summer-only breeding visitor.
The placement of the New World vultures has been unclear since the early 1990s. The reason for this is the controversial systematic history of the New World vultures as they were assumed to be more related to (or a subfamily of) Ciconiidae (the storks) after Sibley and Ahlquist work on their DNA-DNA hybridization studies conducted in the late ...
However, unlike Old World vultures, which find carcasses by sight, New World vultures have a good sense of smell with which they locate carrion. Six species have been recorded in Peru. King vulture, Sarcoramphus papa; Andean condor, Vultur gryphus; Black vulture, Coragyps atratus; Turkey vulture, Cathartes aura
The black vulture locates food either by sight or by following New World vultures of the genus Cathartes to carcasses. [54] These vultures—the turkey vulture, the lesser yellow-headed vulture, and the greater yellow-headed vulture—forage by detecting the scent of ethyl mercaptan, a gas produced by the beginnings of decay in dead animals. [55]