Scavengers as Vultures are important links in the food chain, yet their value is not recognized and surly not appreciated by the human society. Several events of vandalism towards vulture species in Armenia had shown that those large raptors need a proper protection from our side; otherwise, their numbers will dramatically decrease just from the illegal poaching activities motivated by the regions’ cultural features of proving strength by killing large animal, mostly - predator. All four-vulture species, which bread in Armenia, are listed in the Red book of Armenia and IUCN Red List of Threatened Species with different statuses (Bearded vulture or lammergeyer - Gypaetus barbatus (NT A2cde), Griffon vulture - Gyps fulvus (LC), Egyptian vulture - Neophron percnopterus (EN A2bcde+3bcde), Cinereous vulture - Aegypius monachus (NT C1)). Our organization already started to work towards vulture protection and conservation by using the tool of eco-education. Last year we had organized a month of Vulture Awareness, which combined series of activities for the public sector (lectures at schools – “Vultures of Armenia, public lectures, birdwatching excursions, contest “How will I protect my favourite vulture” among school children, also information sharing in social media).

During our survey, we discovered that all different layers of society that we had worked with had one thing in common: poor knowledge of vultures as scavengers and their great use for nature. Ninety percent were sure that vultures are dangerous because they can hunt little children. Only seven percent could mention the importance of scavengers and vultures for the food chain and nature. This shows how poor the knowledge about vultures is in Armenia. From the other hand, the traditional feature of killing a large animal to prove strength and manhood in combination with absence of knowledge of importance of vultures for our ecosystem creates perfect conditions for those species’ extinction.