#ossifrage

BONE SAW BIRD

I can share this one now since a Patron already snagged it! (They get first dibs always!)

Day 13 of #birdtoberclub2025 hosted by @kaylafiskbirds is Scavenger for which I picked the bone eating Bearded Vulture.

If anyone calls me a bird larp, I'll maul you idc. Yes I'm making Simon a bearded vulture no I don't care that it's a popular bird.

Anyways, I love wingfics/ ave au's so so much I think I'll make my own. It's the most fitting to me that Simon would be a bearded vulture for many reasons.

Starting, Lammergeiers are the only true animals to practice osteophagy. While plenty of animals practice bone eating, Lammergeiers are the only ones who rely on it in their diet, being 80-95% bone. The bone matrix and marrow is what they are getting their nutrients from (surprisingly higher energy than muscle), which is so fitting for Iron Lung's overall theme of blood. Maybe this would make for a reason why Simon is chosen for this mission, rather than one of the other convicts? An ocean of blood is disturbing and upsetting, so maybe he's sent down there under the assumption he'll be less disturbed by the environment. (He is still plenty disturbed, thanks.)

There used to be mythology surrounding these birds that they'd lift lambs and drop them from high altitudes to kill and eat them. This, of course, is not true. While Lammergeiers are big, they don't have enough strength or mass to both fly and carry medium-sized mammals (8-12lbs is a lot to carry). However, the narrative caused widespread hunting of these birds under the guise of protecting livestock. Now, I think we all see the glaring connection here. Simon is a sacrifice for the COI to send him into the blood ocean. Being persecuted for deaths he didn't cause (at least not directly). He's absolutely the Lammergeier being murdered for something he didn't do.

Another fun trait is Lammergeiers will coat their feathers in ferrous dust. They inhabit the Himalayas, which have iron-rich dust (Hell, Himalayan salt is pink because of the presence of iron). Lammergeiers will choose to paint their feathers red; the deeper the color, the higher the status and the more successful the individual is perceived. Now I just think this is a fun thematic connection, not anything deep. But iron being the core of hemoglobin for vertebrate's blood is right on theme.

There's plenty more connections I could make or straws to grasp at, but I think it's a perfect fit.

Now, for Grace, I've settled on a Fox Kestrel. One, the name and color scheme are plenty fitting. Two, there is very little known about them. They are criminally understudied. All that's known about them is their diet, flock lifestyle, and territorial nature.

They are sedentary birds, so they do not migrate. They sometimes stay in colonies of up to 20 members during breeding and chick-rearing seasons (This would include single members with no mate or young). This would make Grace's forced expedition extra hard for him. Being away from any community and being shipped off to another location, not on Earth, but into space indefinitely, would be an extra-rough pill to swallow.

They're frequently overlooked and under noticed by human communities they cohabitate with. Since there are so any of them, they're unrecognized. This is very Ryland Grace, as he has been overlooked and hasn't been taken seriously until he was scouted to research Astrophage.

The bearded vulture, the ossifrage

The only known vertebrate with a diet of up to 90% bones, this magnificent bird will swallow small bones, but when they find a larger one this doesn't mean no dinner! Instead, the vulture will pick up the bone and fly anywhere between 50-150 metres before dropping the bone onto some rocks to shatter it. Then the bird will eat the fragments, and also the exposed bone marrow. Sometimes if it doesn't crack the first time the process will be repeated until the ossifrage is successful.

Sadly the bearded vulture is Europe's rarest vulture once seen throughout the mountain ranges of southern Europe, persecution for a belief of threat to livestock (the old name lammergeier meaning "lamb-vulture" originates from a belief that they killed lambs), as well as a lack of once abundant large herbivores on these mountain ranges has led to a decline in the numbers of these vultures.