Berchtesgaden/Garmisch-Partenkirchen (dpa/lby) – The female bearded vulture Wally probably fell victim to a rockfall in the Zugspitz area. It looks like Wally sat down to eat and was hit by a stone, said the bearded vulture expert from the State Association for Bird Protection (LBV), Toni Wegscheider, on Wednesday. The “Süddeutsche Zeitung” had first reported on it.
At the end of May, a climbing team from the LBV found the remains of the animal that had been released the previous year. Bones, feathers, a ring and the GPS transmitter that the experts had used to locate Wally lay in an inaccessible gully at an altitude of 1,500 meters. Nearby, experts found the remains of a young deer – fodder for bearded vultures, which are scavengers.
There will probably never be any definitive certainty about the cause of death. Because Wally’s head was missing – a fox may have gotten it. “Ultimately, we can’t determine the cause of death from the cadaver,” said Wegscheider. However, the investigations are not yet complete. “The bones are further in elaborate toxic studies to get even more clarity.”
Wally was released into the wild in the Berchtesgaden National Park last summer together with the female Bavaria. In June, two young bearded vulture women were released there again: Dagmar and Recka. All four animals come from a breeding program in Spain and are related: Recka is Wally’s sister, Dagmar is Bavaria’s cousin.
