They are easily distinguished in the air.

The black vulture flies rather heavily--flapping his wings several times with a quick repetition, and then holding them horizontally for a hundred yards or so--while his short ill-proportioned tail is spread out like a fan.

The buzzard, on the contrary, holds his wings at rest--not in a horizontal position, but bent considerably upward.

In this attitude he will skim along for a quarter of a mile, without a single stroke of his wings, and that, too, not downward as may be supposed, but along a level, or a line often curving upward! How he executes this upward movement is not known.

Some suppose that he possesses the power of inflating himself with heated air, which enables him to soar upward without using his wings.