Wildlife
Lammergeiers are long-winged vultures known for their unusual habit of dropping bones on to rocks to smash them open and get at the marrow. They have a widespread distribution in the mountains of Europe, Asia and Africa, and are common in the mountainous highlands of Ethiopia.
Scientific name: Gypaetus barbatus
Rank: Species
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High-altitude animals
The lammergeier, red-billed chough and tahr live in the highest Himalayas.
The lammergeier, red-billed chough and tahr live in the highest Himalayas.
Smashing scavengers
Lammergeiers outdo ravens at breaking bones into edible morsels.
Lammergeiers outdo ravens at breaking bones into edible morsels.
Bone breakers
Highly specialised vultures want just one thing from a carcass, bones!
With a wingspan of 2 metres, the lammergeiers soar across the skies over the mountains. Picking out the bones from a carcass, they smash them against rocks to expose the nutritious bone marrow. Young birds need plenty of practise, it can take a full seven years to get bone breaking mastered.
The following habitats are found across the Lammergeier distribution range. Find out more about these environments, what it takes to live there and what else inhabits them.
Discover what these behaviours are and how different plants and animals use them.
Additional data source: Animal Diversity Web
Least Concern
Year assessed: 2009
Classified by: IUCN 3.1
The Bearded Vulture (Gypaetus barbatus), also known as the Lammergeier or Lammergeyer, is a bird of prey, and the only member of the genus Gypaetus. Traditionally considered an Old World vulture, it actually forms a minor lineage of Accipitridae together with the Egyptian Vulture (Neophron percnopterus), its closest living relative. They are not much more closely related to the Old World vultures proper than to, for example, hawks, and differ from the former by their feathered neck. Although dissimilar, Egyptian and Bearded Vultures both have a lozenge-shaped tail that is unusual among birds of prey.
It eats mainly carrion and lives and breeds on crags in high mountains in southern Europe, the Caucasus,Africa, the Indian Subcontinent, and Tibet, laying one or two eggs in mid-winter which hatch at the beginning of spring. Populations are resident.
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Desert
Mediterranean forest
Mountain grassland
Moorland
Mountains
Tropical coniferous forest
Carnivorous
Courtship display
Adapted to flying
Altitude tolerant
Monogamous
Moulting
Egg layer
Parental investment
Scavenger
Visual communication