Various Turkey Vultures

by Michelle, Ron, Janice Apse, Christopher S Matthews,
(Brampton, Georgetown, Oxford Mills, St. Catharines, )

Michelle from Brampton wrote to say ..... A Turkey Vulture flew right in front of my car (as I was driving) and landed under the maple tree beside the road. I was driving along Balmoral Drive between Bramalea Road and Torbram Road in South/East Brampton (Bramalea to us locals) on Tuesday Oct 14th 2014 at 4:00 pm when I saw it. I have never seen a bird that large in the area before and certainly not so close to my car. There is a good size park and some green space between the housing divisions but nothing heavily wooded around for 4 km or so. We've had a larger than normal squirrel population this Fall which has resulted in a larger number of roadkill on local roads. So I guess the Turkey Vulture was on clean-up duty. I will keep an eye out for more circling the area. Maybe I'll get lucky and get a picture of them.

Ron, from Georgetown, wrote to say he saw a Turkey Vulture for the first time ..... Saw one today in our garden in Georgetown Ontario. We have a large terraced garden. I saw it up on the hill at the back, tearing at some sort of animal. Assuming a rabbit. There are lots of rabbits around here.

Another of our readers saw Turkey Vultures recently ..... In September of 2014 we noticed over twelve large birds circling down town Port Hope. They circled slowly over the town eventually floating north over town. Using the binoculars and a bit of research, we realized that these were Vultures. They are probably here to feed on the salmon that are running up the Ganaraska River.

One of our readers from Brampton wrote to say ..... Driving home on September 18th I noted a large bird on the road at Centre and Williams Parkway area in Brampton standing over a small roadkill victim! It was pretty huge and originally I thought it was a crow but when it turned it's head and I saw the red I knew it was a Turkey Vulture. As I approached it in my car it was spooked and flew off. Unfortunately it didn't return.

Dr Janice Apse from Oxford Mills, says ..... I saw a group of eleven birds going after carrion. I live in Oxford Mills, Ontario.

Christopher wrote to say ..... While sitting on long beach this past summer I spotted a very large flying object. I thought at first it was a small aircraft but it did not move through the air very fast at all. I thought perhaps it was a bird but I had never seen one and then another to make two so large in my life. They were a few miles away and several hundred up in the air perhaps even a thousand feet. I have no idea what they were but, I heard someone nearby say it was a Turkey Vulture. I've never heard of this kind of bird before, but I'm sure I'd have remembered if I had. If anyone may know what kind of bird a did see could you be kind enough to let me know.

Thank you for sending us your reports of your Turkey Vulture sightings - I have combined them onto one page, to enable our readers to locate them easily.

I will also be posting this, and other reports of animal sightings on our facebook page at Discover Southern Ontario on Facebook