2011-01-31 15:25:44
The vultures of the New World, condors, auras and vultures, constitute the family of cathartids. They are American scavengers, similar to the true vultures that inhabit Eurasia and Africa, although they are not closely related to them. The closest relatives of the cathartids were the teratornitids (“monster birds”), an extinct group of huge birds of prey that lived in the Americas between the Miocene and Pleistocene epochs. Due to their size and the structure of their wings, teratornithids flew like condors, taking advantage of thermal currents to gain height and effortlessly gliding long distances in search of prey.
Unlike cathartis, teratornithids were active predators; the structure of its beak, more similar to that of eagles than that of vultures, was better suited to swallowing prey whole than to tearing pieces of meat from larger prey or carrion. In addition, their legs were longer, giving them more mobility on the ground for walking, trotting, and stalking prey. The smaller teratornids, about the size of a condor, probably fed on frogs, lizards, rodents, and small birds. The largest of them all, Argentavis magnificens, could swallow prey the size of a hare.
Argentavis magnificens (“magnificent Argentine bird”), a bird with a wingspan of about seven meters and as tall as a man, lived in the Argentine Pampas at the end of the Miocene, between 8 and 6 million years ago. Its wingspan is double that of the albatross, the largest among living birds; its weight, estimated at seventy or eighty kilos, was four times that of the Great Bustard, the heaviest flying bird in existence.
Argentavis magnificens is also the oldest known teratornid. The last teratornids disappeared from North America at the end of the Pleistocene, about 12,000 years ago.
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