But think about it — what would happen if there were no scavengers
to clean out the carcasses of those dead seals on McClure’s beach —
dead seals that the tourists who’ve come all the way
from Amsterdam or Hong Kong
or Kansas City would have to look at and smell?
So indeed, turkey vultures are good for the economy, as well as the ecology,
whether it’s road kill from speeding automobiles
in too much of a hurry to slow or swerve,
or plane propellers guillotining a gull,
or even an innocent window bonking a beak,
someone has to clean up after us and our ever mad machines.
Otherwise, we’d be drowning in bacteria…
Otherwise, we’d all be sick and dying…
So please consider, next time you make fun
of their featherless, naked necks and heads,
that nature knew what she was doing.
Their heads and necks are designed that way
so they can reach deep into the carcass cavities,
get well up under that rib cage, clean up every tender morsel,
pick the bones white and clean, pristine…gleaming…
George O’Keefe panting ready!
Think about it…
Do you think she’d have painted those steer skulls
if they’d had decaying flesh
and moldering skin still clinging to them?
Do you?
So if you need to,
consider them the artist helpers,
the ecological aesthetic keepers,
the clever cleaner-uppers,
the avine dust busters,
the natural anti-bacterialistas, and above all,
the real recyclers of the whole she-bang.
And next time,
next time you’re walking along the beach
hand in hand with your honey
and you come across the aforementioned vulture in the sand
cleaning out the carcass,
gobbling up the guts
of say, a seal,
or even a shark,
washed up out of the ocean,
be thankful,
be respectful,
be grateful.
You might even whip off your hat and bow.
And if you’re lucky enough
in your hiking up hills and dales or mountain trails to
stumble upon a vulture feather,
you can put it on your altar in homage
even if — and it’s okay by me — if
you wash it first.
They understand.
Some good points about the turkey vulture Marilyn. We see them a lot here in Florida.
I love "anti-bacterialistas." lol