I never really cared about vultures.I mean who would? Its not like they're incredibly beautiful, or have a pleasant call to listen to, in fact they are noisy, ugly and smelly birds. So there's really not much to love about them. However, something happened that changed the way I felt about these birds and made me appreciate their importance to humans and the rest of the world.

Living on a farm wasn't easy. There was always work to do after we got home from school and hardly had any time to play. I'm not complaining about it because I had the best childhood anyone could have offered and my parents made sure of it but life was still difficult.

My father grew millet, sesame, and French beans and we had all kinds of animals on the farm. The weather was hot and dry most of the time, so when it became unbearable we would often run out of water and many of our animals would die of thirst. Whenever an animal died the carcass was taken outside the farm area and left to the birds and other wild animals that would come and eat it.

One year we had a drought. We lost so much that year, our crops and our animals died quickly without water. We lost two goats from our herd and a cow. So as usual my brother and I dragged the bodies outside the farm to a barren field and left them there for the vultures to eat. The next morning, on my way to school I saw the dead animal bodies still lying there. This usually wouldn't have been an unusual sight because they normally lay there for a day or two before being completely eaten up by the wild animals. But today there was something missing.no vultures. I didn't understand it; normally they would be swarming around the carcasses, fighting each other for little scraps of meat and bone. But today there were none.

I thought about it till I got to school but forgot all, once the lessons started. At home that afternoon Bhai and I were cleaning the storeroom out when I remembered again.
"Bhai, did you see any vultures today?" I asked.

He thought for a moment and said, "Come to think of it, I haven't seen any today. Why do you ask?"

"Well doesn't it seem a bit strange? I mean there are two fat animals lying outside the farm and there aren't any vultures pecking at it yet?"

"Well they're only vultures you know, who really cares?"

"That's right I thought.they are only vultures." But the strange thing was that I did care, and I didn't know why. A couple of days later, while having breakfast with my family I overheard my father talking to my mother.

"Did you hear that since the drought there have been only a few vultures sighted?" said my father.

"I know, I know it's so strange," said my mother

"Especially now with all these dead animals lying about - the area is looking so filthy. You know I heard that a group of scientists are coming to investigate why the vultures have suddenly gone missing."

I thought about this on my way to school that day. Why were scientists coming to our farm? Did that mean that there was something seriously wrong...?

I was so engrossed in my thought that I would have missed seeing it, had it not been for the loud 'thump' that I heard. I looked up and saw a large dark brown heap on the ground under a large tree. I ran towards it, curious to know what it was. It was a vulture; the first I had seen in two weeks but it was dead. On another tree about ten feet away were two vultures perched. They seemed all right except for their heads; they were hanging upside down, like they were trying to look at something the wrong way around.

It was Friday and the weekend was ahead of me and I wanted to get home as fast as possible, there were cricket matches to organize, and friends to be called over for dinner on Saturday. So to get home faster I decided to take the shorter route, the one that went past the dump where all the dead animals lay. It smelt so bad that I had to run past it and there were flies and crows all over the place. I walked on into our fields that were right next to the dump, and boy was I glad to get away from that stench!

At dinner later that evening both Bhai and my father looked really tired. Bhai didn't have school so he had been working in the fields with Abu all day.

"I think I'm going to go to sleep early tonight," said Bhai.

"That sound like a good idea." said Abu,

"My joints are aching tonight..." complained Bhai.

"That's strange, your joints never ache..." said Ami with concern.

So they went to sleep early, even earlier than I did!

The next morning Ami had to call for the doctor to come to our house because both Bhai and Abu were ill. They were both throwing up and complained of dizziness and achy joints. The doctor asked Ami whether they had eaten something that was spoilt or drank water from a well. She said she didn't think so and so the doctor ordered them both to have blood tests and told Ami that she should keep herself, Sonya (my little sister) and myself away from them in case they had caught some infection.

That night I called all my friends over for a night cricket match. My best friends Sharik and Ali came as well as the rest of my school friends. While taking a break from the game, Sharik said that his younger brother had had a fever for two days now and didn't want to eat anything. Another friend Zohair said that his mother had been sick with stomach aches and pains too.

"Maybe its just because its so hot and the food is going bad faster." suggested Ali, but somehow I knew, deep down that it wasn't only the heat that was making all these people sick.

On Monday when I entered the classroom I saw some unfamiliar faces at the front of the room, talking to our teacher Mrs. Ahmed. "Now everyone take your seats," said Mrs. Ahmed, "Today we have some important visitors here from Karachi and England. Professor Kamal is an Ornithologist; Dr. Baker is here from the UK. He is a vet and member of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, and last we have Dr. Rauf, who is an animal epidemiologist (someone who studies diseases that are widespread), from the Zoological Survey of Sindh. They are here to talk to us about the vulture problem."

We all stood up and said good morning to the doctors and then sat down again.

"Good morning class, we are here to talk to you not only about what is happening to the vultures today, but also to tell you a little about vultures and how important they are to the environment. Has anyone noticed that there is something wrong with the vultures living around here?" asked Dr. Baker. "You son, what's your name?" he said pointing at me.

"Hamid" I told him

"Tell me Hamid, what have you noticed?"

"Well, " I said nervously, "There don't seem to be that many vultures around anymore and it's weird because there is so much for them to eat. I've only seen a couple of them around, but."

"But what Hamid?" asked the doctor.

".they're acting funny, like they're sick or something. Their heads were drooping down to their chests."

"Thank you Hamid, you may be seated now. You see class, all around India and Pakistan vultures have started acting this way, no one knows why but we think they have some kind of disease."
"Vultures are some of the worlds largest birds. They are special because they are some of the only animals that feed on dead bodies alone. By doing this they act as scavengers and take care of getting rid of decaying matter as fast as possible. But now they seem to be catching some kind of disease that is spreading quickly. Indian authorities first noticed the 'head-drooping' symptoms in one of their National Parks. We have been studying the vultures throughout Sindh and have found that they seem to have the same symptoms as the Indian species." said Dr. Rauf.

"Vultures usually die within a month of their behaving like this. One day they will simply drop off the tree they are perched on and fall to the ground with a thump," said Dr. Kamal.

'That's what I saw,' I thought.

They explained to us how vultures, though ugly and smelly birds, are important to ecosystems. Without these birds, dead bodies are not consumed and they then begin to rot, which causes diseases to spread. The rest of the time was spent telling us about how they were going to do some research around the village and collect and test vultures. When they left we carried on with our regular classes but I found that I couldn't concentrate on my schoolwork. My mind kept drifting back to that loud 'thump' I heard when the vulture fell off the tree. We saw the scientists a lot after that, along with different people who brought equipment and took different birds and water samples. They got permission from everyone to go around their farms, collecting vultures, and taking samples of soil, water, plants and animals. They also asked everyone questions.

The village doctor was very busy that month, everyone got sick, stomach infections, fever, flu, everything seemed to be going around all at once. Sharik's little brother, who had been sick had to be taken to the nearby town to stay in the hospital there. Even Sonya had a stomachache, but thankfully it wasn't serious, and Ami and I managed to keep well. Abu got better after about a week of staying in bed. The doctor said that both he and Bhai had caught hepatitis. Bhai never really recovered from it. For a while after that, he was weak and drowsy and had problems concentrating at school. The doctor said that his liver got damaged while he was sick.

When the professors and doctors came and visited our house they suggested one reason for Abu and Bhai having gotten sick. They told us that because the vultures weren't eating the dead animals, nature had to use other ways of getting rid of them. The bodies had begun to disintegrate due to decomposers, mainly bacteria. Bacteria can be both harmful and harmless and some of them can cause disease. They had gotten into the underground water system and that was probably what was making everyone so ill. Abu and Bhai must have caught their infections from drinking water from the well that was near the dump, while they were working in the fields.

The scientists left our village after having spent about two weeks working and studying. The remains of the animals had to be taken to another location where they would not cause such harm to humans. The dump was disinfected by spreading a herbal powder over it and people gradually began to get better. However, there were still cases of sickness every time an animal was left too long without moving it away from the village.

Every time I see a vulture around, occasionally feeding on dead remains, I feel sad, not because I love vultures, but because no one knows what to do to help them. Scientists are still trying to find out what is slowly killing these mighty birds of prey. I wonder what it is and when they will find out, I wonder what people like you and me can do to help.

by Natasha Kamal