The Griffon vulture on Naxos

Written by astrid on 26. November 2022. Posted in Nature, Naxos, Animals, Birds.

The island of Naxos now lives mostly off its tourism, but it also still has quite a bit of agriculture – at least for local consumption – and above all many shepherds and many goats and sheep: Naxos has more goats and sheep than all the other Cyclades and islands of the Dodecanese combined. And thus, surprisingly – given the size of the island – Naxos is also home to the only breeding population of the Griffon vulture in the Aegean, apart from Crete. Griffon vultures feed only on carrion from large animals (goats, sheep, donkeys…), which is why they can only survive where there are sufficient numbers of more or less wild sheep and goats.

The vulture population on Naxos had declined significantly in the last decades of the 20th century, mainly due to losses from poisoned bait laid out by shepherds to kill ravens. As a result, the vultures no longer bred and roosted on Naxos itself, but only on the island of Herakleia to the south, from where they flew to Naxos every day in search of food – a highly unusual situation. Fortunately, however, the population has recovered in recent years. According to a survey by the Ornithological Society of Greece, more than 10 young vulture have hatched and grown up on Naxos this year (2022) and the population has risen to over 50 individuals.

In the summer, we had the opportunity to observe vultures (from a great distance) at a nesting site in a rock face near Kóronos; later, we were able to watch more than ten vultures settle down to sleep at sunset on a smaller rock face of Mount Fanári.

A vulture flies away from its nest at ‘Kólo tou Vounoú’ below Kóronos.

A second one joins it.

We see the rock face from the hiking trail opposite. Despite the considerable distance, we hear loud cries, probably from the young vulture (nearly grown up by now) sitting in the nest.

Here you can see the two vultures sitting in their nest; unfortunately, the photo is not very good due to the great distance.

Vultures at sunset on Mount Fanári

A beautiful sight!

Every evening, the vultures settle down to sleep in the cliffs visible here (bottom center).

At least nine vultures can be seen in the photo, eight sitting and one approaching.

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