Figure 01. In the 1980s, only 27 California Condors were living in the wild, chiefly dying due to lead poisoning from hunters’ bullets and shot pellets. Conservationists radically decided to capture all of them and start a captive-breeding program. This hugely successful program has seen these condors go from being EW, Extinct in the Wild, to the release of 287 condors by 2019, who now live and breed in the wild, with more being released each year.
Condor is believed to be a Spanish-ized version of a Quechua word, cuntur or kuntur, for these birds. (Quechua is the indigenous language of Peru, which has spread to neighboring Andean countries.) The California Condor’s genus name, Gymnogyps, comes from Greek, gymno, “naked” or “bare,” probably alluding to its bare head and neck, and gyps, for “vulture.” The second part of its binomial scientific name, the Latin californianus, like the first part of its common name, California, point to its main home territory. Contemporary Mexican Spanish for it is Cóndor Californiano.
Taxonomy
To summarize the taxonomy for this vulture: kingdom, Animalia; phylum, Chordata; class, Aves; order, Cathartiformes; family, Cathartidae; genus, Gymnogyps; species, Gymnogyps californianus; common name, California Condor. Like most other vultures, it is monotypic, having no subspecies. As elucidated in the first of these four blogs, the taxonomy of the Cathartidae family has been fraught, but as of 2010, the American Ornithologists’ Union placed the California Condor in the family Cathartidae, order Cathartiformes.
Zoologist George Kearsley Shaw (1751–1813) identified about 100 taxa (scientific groupings, such as genus, species, order) during his lifetime. In 1797, he formally identified Vultur californianus (now Gymnogyps californianus), based on a type specimen found by Archibald Menzies off the coast of California. Vultur is the same genus as Vultur gryphus, the Andean Condor. Later analysis revealed that the two condors differ enough to be separated into two genera (singular, genus).
Shaw’s species description was accompanied by an illustration by Frederick Polydore Nodder. Years earlier, in 1789, Shaw’s periodical, The Naturalist’s Miscellany had published a preliminary identification of this species (Vol. 9, No. 1, pl. 301 , https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/124620#page/12/mode/1up ). The Naturalist’s Miscellany was published by Nodder, along with his wife, Elizabeth, also a scientific illustrator; after Frederick’s death, she continued to publish the periodical as “Published by Elizabeth Nodder, Sons & Co.” Their second son, Richard Polydore Nodder, also illustrated it.
This species is widely known for having gained the notorious conservation status of EW, Extinct in the Wild, in 1987, when conservationists took the radical step of capturing and removing all remaining wild California Condors and placing them into captive-breeding programs. These programs’ success has been exemplary and is discussed further later in this blog, in the section, Conservation and Management.
The California Condor is not the first species in the Gymnogyps genus to face extinction. Between 2.5 million years ago and now, there were four other species in this genus, which did become extinct, as evidenced by their fossil remains (including some found at Los Angeles’s La Brea Tar Pits). During the Pleistocene Epoch (ca. 2,580,000–11,700 years ago), this genus was widespread across the Americas — as far from California as Florida, Cuba, and Peru. Specific evidence of the California Condor dates back to just 40,000 years ago, but it was present during the megafauna extinctions of the late Pleistocene Epoch.
Figure 02. The California Condor is not the first species in its genus to face extinction, as evidenced by fossils of now-extinct condors.
Description
Measurements
The California Condor is the largest North American land bird (i.e., not a sea bird, such as an albatross). Typically, each weighs about 18–20 pounds (8–9 kg), but they range 15–31 pounds (7–14.1 kg) — comparable to Andean Condors, and even to Trumpeter Swans (15–30 pounds, 7–13 kg), the heaviest of North American bird species. (In Europe, the Mute Swan is heavier, weighing 20–32 pounds, 9–14 kg.) When captive-reared condors were compared with wild-caught birds at the San Diego Zoo’s Safari Park, the weights of males were comparable. The same was found for females, with no evident weight differences across seasons of the year or ages of adult birds.
Unlike most other birds of prey, female California Condors weigh less than males; specifically, females typically weigh 15.4–19.6 pounds (7.0–8.9 kg), whereas males typically weigh 17.4–21.8 pounds (7.9–9.9 kg). Researchers have questioned historic weight measurements of these birds, suspecting that partially filled crops may have accounted for some weight measurements. Newly hatched chicks weigh about 6.5 ounces (0.4 pounds, 0.18 kg).
The California Condor’s length, bill to tail, is 43–55″ (109–140 cm); the American White Pelican is usually longer, about 50–70″ (130–180 cm) long, but 10.3–15.2″ of that is its bill! Far more impressive than the condor’s length is its wingspan, 98″–118″ (8′ 2″ to 9′ 10″, 2.5–3 m). Some observers claim to have seen an 11-foot (3.4 m) wingspan, but none longer than 10 feet (3.1 m) have been verified. In any case, it’s the longest wingspan of any North American land bird. (Trumpeter Swans range 74–122″, 6’2″ to 10’2″, 1.9–3.1 m.) Each broad wing is about 30.6–36″ (77.7–91.5 cm) long — about the length of a baseball bat.
Figure 03. Measurements of California Condors
Its broad, round-edged, wedge-shaped tail is about 13–15″ (33–38 cm) long (many laptops are about 14″ long). Less impressive is its tarsus length, 4.3–4.9″ (10.9–12.4 cm), ankle to toes. Bill size is 3.6–4″ (9.2–10.1 cm) long, base to tip; 1.5–1.6″ (3.7–4.0 cm) deep, top to bottom at the base; and 1.2–1.5″ (3–3.7 cm) wide, side to side.
Plumage
The California Condor adult’s plumage is mostly black, with white accents. On the dorsal (back) upperwings, the wing coverts are tipped with white, creating narrow streaks of white on the upper wing feathers. On each underwing, white feathers form large right-angle triangles, which sharply contrast with the wings’ black feathers (e.g., see https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/32298541 ). Around its neck is a fluffy ruff of wispy black plumulaceous (unhooked, down-like) feathers. Condors can erect their ruff feathers or lower them to cover or expose the neck beneath.
Figure 04. From the back (and from above), when its enormous black wings are stretched out, a thin horizontal line of white plumage can be seen along the back of each wing. The primary feathers extend from the “wrist” bump outward, and the secondary feathers extend from the wrist inward, toward the shoulders. From the front (and from below), its plumage is readily identifiable — huge black underwings with bright white right-angle triangles.
Each extra-long wing includes 10 full-length primary feathers (attached to the outer “hand” of the condor) and 19 secondary feathers (attached to the inner “arm”), as well as 3 tertial feathers (at the inner edge of the wing). These wing feathers are remiges (singular, remex). It also has 12 tail feathers, called rectrices (singular, rectrix); occasionally, this condor may have 14 rectrices (never an asymmetrical 13). When the wing is viewed as a hand, the “thumb” (pollex) has a claw extending about 1.2″ (3 cm) in adults.
There have been no observations of geographic variations or sex-specific differences in plumage appearance or in molting strategies.
These condors do, however, show age differences in plumage. Upon hatching, the chicks are enrobed in short dense white down, except on the head and neck. Within about a month, white down is replaced by wooly dark-gray down, which then extends to some parts of the head and neck within another 20 days or so. Over time, these downy feathers are replaced by black-brown pennaceous (barbed, hooked) feathers (better suited to flight). Immature condors’ underwings lack crisp white triangles, appearing more mottled grayish. Over time, their underwing feathers transform to the pure white of adults. Their ruff feathers may appear shorter than those of adults.
A longitudinal study of these condors at the San Diego Safari Park (formerly San Diego Wild Animal Park) revealed that they may not show full adult plumage until 7 or 8 years of age. The rate of change, achieved sequentially through annual molts, varies across individuals, so observers can’t be sure of a bird’s age based on its plumage. Though data on wild birds aren’t robust, they appear to be similar to those of these captive birds.
When molting (always bilateral, symmetrical), these condors molt their remiges (wing feathers) sequentially: primary feathers (at the outer edges of the wings) are molted from far to near, secondary feathers from near to far, and tertials from far to near. Rectrices are molted from inner to outer feathers (always bilaterally, symmetrically). The first molt (e.g., as juveniles, ages 2–8 months) is complete, but subsequent molts are often incomplete. On average, in the wild, California Condors replace about 4–5 of the primary feathers on each wing each year. Among adults, longer molted feathers take about 3 ½ – 4 months to regrow. Breeding adults avoid molting during breeding season and during winter months when foraging is already challenging due to shorter days and fewer days of favorable weather.
Figure 05. Up close, the California Condor’s most noticeable plumes are the fluffy plumulaceous (unhooked) feathers of its neck ruff. (Photo on the left shows the protective translucent nictitating membrane sliding across its eye from the inside corner toward the outside corner.) A full-body view (right) shows each shimmering pennaceous (hooked) plume, revealing each feather’s veined structure.
Bare Parts
The head and neck of California Condors are mostly bare, with a scattering of short bristly plumes, an advantage for birds who thrust the head and neck deeply into the rotting carcasses of carrion. The coloration of the neck of an adult may vary from yellowish to brilliant reddish-orange, depending on the bird’s physiological (e.g., flushed from heat) or emotional (e.g., courting) state. They may also inflate the air sacs within the gular (throat) pouch and the neck, increasing the visibility of these areas.
The transition from young condor to adult appearance is more rapid in the bare parts than in the underwing plumage. The head and neck of hatchlings may be pale or grayish yellow, which darkens to gray and then to blackish gray in immature condors, with some red/orange/yellow freckling and blotching as they mature. As they approach maturity, their bare parts become orange/yellow/pink. Immature birds can’t fully inflate the gular and neck air sacs.
In adult California Condors, the elongated hooked bill is mostly ivory, with much of it concealed by the skin on its head (see Figure 03 for measurements). A dark-brown patch across the base of the bill may vary in size across individuals. The bill of a hatchling is dark and blackens further as it develops into a juvenile. Over the next few years, the bill becomes blue-gray then gradually lightens to pale gray, with dark streaks or blotches, eventually becoming ivory. One report notes that the tongue and the interior of the mouth are yellow. Eyes are brownish red in adults, though they start out as dark grayish brown in nestlings.
The California Condor has feathered legs down to the ankle. The ankle has a pink/red patch in front, and below the ankle, the feet are unfeathered. Though its feet are gray, they often look white, coated with excreta, especially in hot weather (see urohidrosis). Like other condors, its toes are anisodactyl (three toes pointing forward, one pointing backward), but the middle front toe is extra-long, and the hind toe is much shorter than the others. Its short “talons” (claws) are blunt-tipped and slightly curved downward, making it easy to walk, hop, or run, but not easy to use for grasping or gripping. The legs and feet of hatchlings are yellowish gray, becoming gray by the time they fledge.
Figure 06. It might be a stretch to call California Condors “pretty,” but their plumage is truly beautiful, isn’t it? On the other hand, no one’s likely to say their feet are cute.
Sounds and Vocal Behavior
Like other vultures, the California Condor has no syrinx (the vocal organ of songbirds), so it can’t sing or make musical vocalizations. Instead, it grunts, hisses, wheezes, and snorts — calls that can’t be heard at a distance. In fact, the https://xeno-canto.org/species/Gymnogyps-californianus website has zero recordings of this species, and the Cornell Lab’s Macaulay Library has just 7 audio recordings (https://search.macaulaylibrary.org/catalog?taxonCode=calcon&mediaType=audio ), despite having 19,666 photos and 124 videos of this species. At close range, chicks have been heard hissing, wheezing, and grunting if humans approach. (A researcher also reported hearing an adult female make a wheezy-squealing sound while laying an egg.)
Though their mouths don’t produce much sound, sometimes the sound of air moving through their wings may become audible. From almost 0.62 miles (1 km) away, observers can hear their ginormous wings flapping when the condor takes flight. Once in flight, the hissing sound of air moving through their wing feathers can sometimes be heard up to 320 feet (100 m) away (https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/163903 ). Whether these wing sounds serve any communication function hasn’t been studied.
Figure 07. Though California Condor vocalizations are rarely heard — at least by human observers — their wingbeats can sometimes be heard from hundreds of feet away.
Distribution, Habitat, Movements
Distribution
As supported by fossil evidence, the California Condor was widespread across North America when humans settled in the Americas. During the 1800s, the California Condor still had a range extending from British Columbia (Canada) to Baja California (Mexico). By 1937, however, its range shrank to just the state of California. By 1981, just 27 birds remained, and in 1983, condor eggs were taken from wild nests, to rear in captivity. In 1987, the last 6 wild free-flying condors were captured, removed from the wild, and moved into a captive-breeding program, in the hope of preventing the extinction of this species. The program has been successful enough that numerous condors have been released to resume breeding in the wild. Second-generation birds (offspring of the first birds released) have now matured to breeding age. These wild-hatched birds have now reared their own wild-hatched chicks in the wild. (See the eBird range map, https://ebird.org/map/calcon? to visualize its range.)
Starting in 1992, hundreds of captive-bred California Condors have been returned to the wild. Initial releases reintroduced these condors to Pinnacles and Big Sur National Parks in central California and to Los Padres and Sespe areas in southern California. Next (in 1996), they were released into Grand Canyon and Zion National Parks in northern Arizona, and then (in 2002) to San Pedro Martir in northern Baja California (Mexico) — all within a relatively narrow range of + 30.7–37.4 degrees northern latitude. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s (USFWS’s) Hopper Mountain National Wildlife Refuge Condor Recovery staff manages the population in southern California, and other populations are similarly managed. By the end of 2019, the total world population was 518 condors, including 337 living in the wild, as well as 181 captive condors. They’re free-flying birds, occasionally seen hundreds of miles from the locations where they were released. It’s expected that as their populations grow, their geographic ranges will expand farther. As of 2020–2021, their range was estimated to be 39,285–156,370 square miles (101,748–405,000 km²). The home range of a California Condor is about 5–6 times bigger from July through October than it is from November through March, probably partly because days are longer and partly because weather conditions are better for soaring flight. (Those observations are based on monitoring reintroduced California Condors.)
Habitat
California Condors are habitat generalists and can be found at 0–6,562 feet (0–2,000 m) elevation (beaches to mountain meadows). They prefer mountainous country at low to moderate elevations, but California Condors can make themselves at home in scrublands, shrublands, rocky areas, coastal areas, forests (woodlands, swamp forests, taiga, palm groves, evergreen or deciduous), grasslands, canyons, ridges, plateaus, and savannas.
Nonetheless, they have specific requirements for their nest sites during breeding season: cave cavities, cliff ledges, rocky outcrops, or large trees (e.g., sequoias). For finding carrion, topography is important. They need elevated perches or downhill slopes for easy takeoff, as well as either ridgelines for catching updrafts or open areas where thermal air currents make soaring possible. They also prefer having open areas such as grasslands for spotting carrion visually. It’s harder to spot carrion in densely vegetated locations. (On the other hand, observers may have more trouble seeing them feeding in dense vegetation, so it can’t be certain that they don’t do so.)
Figure 08. California Condors seek out elevated perches, which make it easier to take flight.
Reintroduced birds are supplied with food at feeding stations, about every 3 days or so. Over time, however, as the population grows and they acclimate more, they rely less on the feeding stations and more on finding their own carrion, ranging longer distances from the stations.
Movements
California Condors don’t migrate, and by all indications, they didn’t migrate historically. Nonetheless, when thermal air currents or other updrafts allow for soaring, they have been observed traveling up to 160–250 miles (250–400 km) looking for carrion.
Food and Foraging
Diet
California Condors are eclectic in their choice of mammalian carrion, feeding on small (e.g., squirrels, rabbits), medium-sized (e.g., sea lions), or large mammals (e.g., deer, cougars, bears, cattle, whales); when choosing among carcasses, they prefer small to medium-sized carrion, which is easier to consume. They’ll occasionally eat dead salmon, but they rarely eat dead bird or reptile carcasses. Though they prefer freshly deceased carcasses, when these aren’t available, they’ll also eat rotten carcasses. They have also been seen ingesting trash (metal, plastic, glass); it’s not known why they do so, but it’s thought that this happens when other food sources aren’t readily available.
Though California Condors rarely feed on roadkill carrion, if recovery personnel observe that behavior, they haze the condors to deter them from doing so, due to the risk of their becoming roadkill themselves.
Foraging and Food Habits
When looking for carrion, a California Condor will soar perhaps 2,000 feet (600 m) above the ground. In addition to visually searching for carrion, they also look for other scavengers (e.g., Turkey Vultures, Common Ravens). Actually, they’re more likely to spot a group of scavengers than to spot carrion. Whenever condors arrive, they can usually intimidate the other scavengers into letting them eat first and longest, but bears ignore them, and Golden Eagles will fight them for the carcass. Prudent condors typically wait for the eagle to be sated; they weigh about twice as much as the eagle, but they lack those deadly talons. These condors also share the carcass with other condors.
Their eating style is feast-or-famine. When they find food, they’ll pig out on 2.2–3.3 pounds (1–1.5 kg) of meat all at once. (Bear in that they weigh an average of about 20 pounds; if you weigh about 150 pounds, that would be like eating 15 pounds of food at one sitting.) After sating their appetite — taking about 10–30 minutes to fill an empty crop — they have no problem going without any food for 1–2 weeks, though they more commonly eat about every 2–3 days. (You might have trouble with that, as well.) They have never been observed storing or caching food. They eat an average of 1.3 pounds (0.6 kg) per day, and their crops typically hold about 3 pounds (1.4 kg) of food.
Figure 09. California Condors can eat more than 10% of their body weight at one feeding, then they can go for days, up to 2 weeks, without eating anything. The only food storage technique a condor uses is to store food in its own crop. (Its crop can hold about 3 pounds of food. That’s about six 8-ounce steaks!).
When feeding on a carcass, a California Condor usually starts with the eyes, the tongue, or the anus, unless the animal’s hide is wounded or otherwise already opened up. Next, they feed on the flesh, avoiding the hide, feathers, fur, hoofs, and other indigestible bits as much as possible. They will, however, eat the teeth and the bones of small and medium-sized animals, which are rich in calcium, and which they can digest.
Drinking, Pellet Casting, and Defecation
When water is available from any number of freshwater sources, California Condors both drink and bathe. California Condors rarely cast pellets, perhaps because they avoid ingesting indigestible matter. When they do cast pellets, the pellets are almost entirely made of hair. Like other vultures, the California Condor often engages in urohidrosis, excreting feces on its legs. As the wet feces air-dry, they offer evaporative cooling. When not engaging in urohidrosis, to defecate, these condors stand, holding their rear ends slightly above horizontal and expel wastes backward. Their roost sites and perches are often heavily encrusted with dried white excrement, both from normal defecation and from urohidrosis. In nest cavities, the dried excrement from parents and chicks may reach 14–16″ (35–40 cm) up the walls of the cavity. When these condors bathe, they wash off any dried excreta.
It cannot be overstated how important vultures are to their ecosystems, removing carrion and the pathogens carried by the carrion. Unfortunately, though these vultures aren’t harmed by the natural pathogens in carrion, they may be poisoned by hunters’ lead ammunition within the carrion they eat.
Locomotion
As mentioned previously, the feet and claws (talons?) of the California Condor aren’t well suited to gripping, but this condor can readily walk (striding with alternating steps), hop, or run (pretty quickly!). To take flight, it hops and runs rapidly, building forward momentum, while continuously flapping its giant wings to lift its massive body into the air. Whenever possible, however, this condor will look for a cliff or other elevated perch to roost or rest, so that it can take off by simply launching into oncoming winds, updrafts, or thermal air currents.
Figure 10. This California Condor is using its wings for balance as it climbs upward.
Like other vultures, the California Condor’s flight muscles aren’t anchored by a large sternum (“breastbone”); without a large sternum, sustained powered (flapping) flight is enormously difficult and takes a lot of energy. Birds (e.g., geese) who continuously power their flight by flapping their wings have a sturdy sternum anchoring their wings, so it is less challenging and less energy-consuming for them to flap to fly, compared with vultures.
In addition to flapping while taking off or landing, California Condors will sometimes use flapping flight to chase away potential avian threats to their nest sites, such as raptors (eagles, condors, ravens).
Also, according to Colin Pennycuick, “The California Condor is near the mass [weight] limit for continuous flapping flight in birds” (https://birdsoftheworld.org/bow/species/calcon/cur/habitat ). Another reason why condors soar instead of flapping their wings is that California Condors have a relatively high wing-loading (7.7 kg/m²; 1 kg = 2.2 pounds; 1 m² = 10.8 square feet). Wing loading is how much of a bird’s weight is being loaded onto the surface area of its wings: the proportion of the bird’s weight, measured in kilograms (or in grams), to the area of the wing, measured in meters of wing width × wing length (or measured in square centimeters). By comparison to these condors, Turkey Vultures have a wing-loading of 4.3–5.5 kg/m². Because California Condors are carrying more weight per area of their wings, they need more air uplift to soar, so they forage either along ridges or only at times when the warm thermal air currents are strong, in the middle of the day and after noon. They’re also more picky about where they forage than are Turkey Vultures, which can get by on less lift than the condors.
Figure 11. Condors rely on getting lift from thermal air currents or from deflected updrafts of air along ridge lines. They can flap to fly, but it’s enormously challenging and energetically costly to do so. Whenever possible, they take flight from an elevated perch.
To stay aloft, the California Condor relies on uplift from thermal air currents or from steep ridges that force air upward. Once it reaches uplifting air currents, it stops flapping and simply soars (lifted upward by thermal air currents or by air updrafts) or glides (descending slowly, under the influence of gravity). Along ridges with updrafts, these condors can follow the ridges seemingly endlessly. When soaring on thermals, they spiral upward, taking about 16 seconds to complete a loop (eagles take about 12–14 seconds, Red-tailed Hawks about 8–10). They also glide from one thermal air current to another, slowly losing altitude until they reach the next thermal current to carry them upward again. Without flapping its wings once, a soaring condor can cover enormous distances, over huge home ranges. While holding its wings horizontal, the outer tips of its primary feathers curl upward during flight.
Researchers who have used satellite telemetry to track their movements found that condor movements closely align with wind speed and the height and speed of thermal air currents. While soaring, a condor can fly as high as 15,100 feet (4,600 m) up, up to 56 mph (90 km/h) — though 31 mph (50 km/h) is more typical. These condors tend to prefer terrain offering advantageous conditions and to avoid terrain that doesn’t. Weather conditions and time of day also play a role, as does the availability of carrion.
Self-maintenance
Because California Condors rely on warm thermal air currents to soar (e.g., to look for carrion), whenever these currents aren’t robust, they spend all night and much of the day at their roost. Outside of breeding season, they typically roost until mid-morning, then forage for 5–6 hours (in winter) or for 7–8 hours (in summer), returning to the roost mid-afternoon or late afternoon. Occasionally, strong favorable winds allow soaring to start early in the morning and to continue late into the evening. (During breeding season, parents may need to extend their foraging hours, to feed their nestlings, as well as themselves.) In the morning, these condors will sometimes make test flights, to see whether the wind conditions and air currents are optimal for soaring. If the conditions aren’t right, they’ll return to roost for longer.
To rest or to sleep, a condor will seek a flat elevated perch, such as a cliff ledge or a long horizontal limb of a tall tree, often near other condors. One sleeping position is to lie belly down, head tucked behind the scapular (shoulder) feathers. Another is to sleep standing up, with head either tucked or dangling from the neck in front of the body. When chicks have been observed sleeping, they’re either lying prone with heads, necks, and legs outstretched, or they’re sitting on their tarsi (legs, from ankles to toes), with head and neck dangling and bill resting on the ground between their feet.
Figure 12. To rest, a California Condor will choose an elevated perch, so that when it’s ready to take flight, it needs only to spread its wings and leap into the air.
When not foraging, California Condors bathe frequently, typically at the top of waterfalls, whence it’s easy to take flight. They’re also known to preen their feathers for hours each day. When preening, they typically run their bill over each feather, from the base to the tip, aligning each one. They also usually nibble a little preen oil from their uropygial gland (preen gland, on the rump) beforehand, to add smoothness for flight.
A condor can’t easily reach its own head and neck to preen, so after finishing a feeding or after feeding a chick, an adult may rub its head or neck on the ground or on nearby objects (e.g., a tree, a rock). In addition, adults often allopreen each other, as well as nestlings. They may do a little head-scratching, too, either while perched or maybe even while flying when there’s an urgent itch.
Stretching may be just on one side, stretching out a leg and a wing and the tail, followed by stretching the opposite side. A condor may also stretch both wings at once, raising both folded wings over its back, tilting its head forward and its tail upward.
Like other vultures, the California Condor will sometimes (especially in early morning) stretch out its wings, either facing away from the sun (more often) or facing toward it. Such poses may dry out the wings prior to taking flight, as well as helping in thermoregulation — warming up in cool weather, or cooling off with the wind in hot weather. Condors also cool off by using urohidrosis, but otherwise, they’re especially attentive to personal (avian?) grooming.
Social Behavior
Most of the time, California Condors are highly gregarious and sociable. During the day, when not foraging, preening, scratching, sunning, or stretching, California Condors spend time interacting with other condors. Most of the year, they roost near one another, and they bathe communally. During breeding season, they’re more territorial, with more widely dispersed nest sites, and they’re less tolerant of contact with one another. Their foraging ranges may be more than 60 miles (100 km) away from the nest sites.
Outside of breeding season, these condors may congregate at carrion, sometimes so densely that they’re touching one another. These condors establish a social hierarchy (pecking order), based on age, body language, various hisses and grunts, and play competitions (which are meant to avoid actual physical harm). Once the hierarchy is established, the dominant birds eat first and longest, and the lower-status birds eat later. These condors are rarely aggressive toward one another. When caring for eggs or chicks, occasionally the two parents may have a dispute over access to their young. Most disputes are settled by some erect-posture face-offs, inflated gular pouches, chases, displacement, and maybe some open-billed jabs or lunges, usually with one of the birds turning to face away, deflating its air sacs, and hunching over. The submissive bird may even try to appease the dominant one by lightly flapping its wings, much as a chick does when begging for food.
Figure 13. Most of the year, California Condors seem to enjoy one another’s company. They’re even willing to share carrion, as long as the established pecking order is maintained.
When feeding at carrion, California Condors aren’t the only birds to show up. Turkey Vultures, Common Ravens, Golden Eagles, and other scavengers won’t pass by a carcass without stopping for a nibble. If the carcass has plenty of food for all scavengers, they share agreeably enough. When the carcass isn’t ample to feed all comers, however, the Golden Eagles may exclude the condors until they have sated their appetites. Sometimes, the condors simply give up and fly off to find food elsewhere.
When condors nest near Prairie Falcons or other large falcons, they may benefit from having the falcons drive off Golden Eagles and other predators. On the other hand, the falcons may harass the condors if they perceive the condors as getting too close to the falcons’ nests. California Condors are wise to be wary of Golden Eagles, which have been documented to have killed adult condors, occasionally. The only other animals known to kill these adult condors are humans.
Golden Eagles also predate on condor eggs and nestlings, as do other predators, such as ravens and bears. A parent condor can easily defend the nest against ravens, and can often fend off a Golden Eagle — by flapping wildly while chasing the eagle — but they aren’t constantly at the nest, so they leave their young vulnerable. Condor nestlings are particularly vulnerable during the daytime, when they may wander away from the nest while parents are out foraging. Most (78%) condor nest sites are inaccessible to mammalian predators (bears, coyotes, cougars), and it’s thought that the reason not all are inaccessible is because some steep cliffs pose the risk of a nestling wandering off and falling to its death.
Breeding
California Condors don’t usually breed each year, probably because it takes a long time to raise their offspring from egg laying to full independence. Among pairs whose offspring don’t survive to complete the first year, the parents typically breed the following year.
Forming and Affirming Pairs
Though most California Condors form monogamous pairs to raise a family, there have been several documented cases of three breeding adults (two males, one female; two females, one male) successfully raising a chick together, with all three adults incubating and feeding the chick. In addition, extra-pair copulations have been noted, in which the female lays an egg that isn’t the biological offspring of her mate (as shown by genetic tests). Observers have also seen homosexual pairs among reintroduced California Condors. There are no known examples of brood parasitism among these condors.
The San Diego Zoo reported a remarkable surprise in 2021: Two unfertilized California Condor eggs were laid by two different mothers; both eggs hatched, and both were male chicks. Neither chick showed any evidence of paternal genes, and both showed all-maternal heritage. Both moms had access to males, and both had mated previously. Sadly, neither male lived long enough to reach sexual maturity, so it’s not known whether they would have been able to reproduce. Fatherless reproduction, parthenogenesis, is rare, and in previous known examples, the embryo died before hatching.
The vast majority of California Condors form monogamous pair bonds that continue stably across multiple breeding seasons. These partners also stay together year-round; when not together, it’s because they’re trading off duties while breeding: foraging, incubating, and brooding. At about 6 years of age, California Condors start to look for a mate. The unmated male condor engorges his head to be bright red, puffing out his neck feathers, and spreading his wings as he moves toward the female he desires. If she decides to accept him, she lowers her head, choosing him as her mate for life.
Though pairs stay together year-round, they still engage in courtship in preparation for breeding. One of the first signs of courtship is coordinated flights as a pair, in which the couple soars, circles, and cruises through their territory, side-by-side. From some observation viewpoints, the two birds seem to fuse into one body. On the ground, the male may display to the female, head forward, drooping wings outward, exaggeratedly strutting legs up and down, swaying back and forth, often with inflated air sacs in the neck — all taking about 1 minute, followed by attempted copulation. If copulation was successful, it lasted less than 1 minute. In some instances, the female may show this wings-out display to the male.
Couples also engage in allopreening, such as by standing side-by-side and nibbling at each other’s head and neck, as well as the skin and feathers in other regions. Please see https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/661819611 , for an example of condors nuzzling each other’s heads.
Figure 14. Even when not engaged in rearing their offspring, California Condor pairs spend most of their long lives together as a couple.
Nests
After breeding begins, and before egg laying starts, each pair checks out various possible nest sites within their large territory. Large cavities in sequoias or other tall trees, caves, cliff ledges, boulder piles with crevices, and other locations are often chosen. Some factors the prospective parents seem to consider when choosing a site are these:
often 2,000–6,000 feet (600–1,830 m) above sea level (far from potential mammalian predators)
If a low-elevation site, probably north-facing
If a high-elevation site, probably south-facing
at least somewhat sheltered from rain or harsh weather
not damp or subject to flooding
entrance wide enough for the condors to fit through and tall enough to enter if ducking
cavity tall enough for the condors to stand up (at least 15″, 38 cm); they also seem to prefer ceilings no higher than 90″, with up to 30″ preferred
rear wall usually not more than 6.6 feet (2 m) deep, allowing for some light to penetrate to the back, where the egg is usually laid
nearby roost site for the parent not on the nest
While visiting the sites, they may continue to engage in courtship displays (e.g., pair flight) and copulation. They may choose to reuse a nest site used previously, but they usually choose a nest site that wasn’t used recently — a way of minimizing the chances of ectoparasites (on skin and feathers) remaining at the nest site. When choosing a site, they spend hours walking around, inspecting it, poking around in the substrate with their bills and feet, perhaps even testing the prospective site with their whole bodies as if incubating. It may take weeks of repeated visits before the pair decides which site will receive their precious egg. Ultimately, it is the layer of the egg who makes the final choice.
Figure 15. Given that the couple typically raises only one youngster every other year, it’s essential that they choose carefully where to make a nest and lay their one precious egg.
The actual “construction” of the nest is minimal. When the parents are going all out, a parent may use its bill to gather up any loose debris (leaves, bark, or other plant matter; gravel; bones; scat; trash; etc.) near where the egg will be laid. They haven’t been seen transporting any material to the nest site from elsewhere. After gathering up the “nest materials,” a parent may plop down in the middle and use its body and wings to pile up a loose shallow bowl of debris. These materials may help soften the blow when the egg is laid, slow the egg from moving around with the parent’s movements during incubation, provide some insulation from the ambient temperature, and keep the egg away from any soil pathogens or moisture. If no debris is handy, however, the ground substrate will have to suffice.
Eggs and Incubation
With each clutch, a California Condor mom lays just one big pale-blue-white (or creamy white) smooth matte-finish egg (10 ounces, 280 g; 3.5–4.7″, 9–12 cm long; 2.6″, 6.7 cm wide), typically every other year. Given that the mom probably weighs about 17.4 pounds (278 ounces), that’s about 3.5% of her overall body weight.
If the egg or the hatchling fails to thrive, she may lay a replacement egg (perhaps about 57% of the time). She may even lay a third replacement egg if both previous eggs fail early in the breeding season. Captive breeders take advantage of this propensity by removing the first egg to rear by hand, inducing the parents to lay a second (and perhaps a third) egg, which the parents can then raise. The second and third eggs weigh decreasingly less than the first egg, but the weight difference doesn’t appear to affect survivability.
About a day or two before the mom lays her egg, she drinks a full crop of water; the reason for doing so isn’t yet known. She also often stands holding her body horizontally during the days just before egg laying. Captive females have been seen consuming bone matter. When ready to lay, the mom stands upright, faces into the nest cave with wing and tail feathers slightly spread out, undergoes several moments of shaking her body, then appears to eject the egg forcefully to the ground.
Within 6–11 minutes after the egg is laid, incubation begins. With both parents incubating the egg, it can take 53–60 days to hatch. Each parental shift lasts about 2.3–5.9 days, with some pairs having shifts of 9 or 10 days each. Though individual pairs differ from one another, across pairs, both males and females have shifts of about the same length. While incubating, the parent usually doesn’t face the cave entrance. From time to time (about once every 1–1.7 hours), the incubating parent will stand up, stretch, preen, gather up materials within reach of the egg, perhaps even fly off to get a drink before returning. When settling down again, the parent usually uses its bill to roll the egg and then repositions the egg onto its feet.
During the shift change, the incubating parent typically takes off and flies in a circle with the returning mate, before the returning mate takes over at the nest. This paired flight may last up to half an hour, during which the eggs are vulnerable to predation. (Not all pairs exchange via a flight; some simply switch off.) Egg neglect can also have deleterious effects on development.
Hatching
Eggs observed in captivity take about 68 hours from first pipping of the eggshell to emerging entirely from the shell; one observation in the wild (via telescope) confirmed this time estimate. In at least one instance, the mom was seen helping with the process by nibbling around the pip hole with her bill, breaking off bits of shell. Andean Condors have shown similar parental aid of hatching. The eggshells are left in the nest and appear to be consumed by the chicks as they develop.
Figure 16. Wikipedia photo of California Condor parent and chick. Description: Gymnogyps californianus. An adult California Condor with its 30-day old chick in a cave nest near Hopper Mountain National Wildlife Refuge, California, USA. Date, 10 June 2008, 08:58. Source, 30-day old California condor chick. Uploaded by Snowmanradio. Author, Joseph Brandt, Pacific Southwest Region U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Sacramento, USA. Licensing w:en:Creative Commons attribution. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license. You are free: to share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work; to remix – to adapt the work. Under the following conditions: attribution – You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use.
Hatchlings emerge with their eyes open, mostly covered with white down, which turns to grayish down within several weeks; they keep this down until they’re about 2 months old. At about 14–16 weeks, they weigh as much as adults, though it will be another 2 months or so before they fledge. Their heads and necks are featherless and usually pale-yellow-orange, and at about 18 weeks, this skin becomes grayish. As juveniles, their body feathers are blackish, with some brownish edges. Their head and neck are largely covered with gray down, and their feather ruff is similar to adults’. The bill is black, and the irises are brown.
Within a few hours, the parents start feeding the hatchling. The hatchling is fed with regurgitated food from the parents’ crop. Both parents share equally in nesting duties, with the on-nest parent being relieved almost daily, more often than occurred during incubation. For the first 2 weeks, parents brood them almost constantly except during feeding. During this time, the parents feed the chicks about once every 2 hours, and they spend time grooming and examining the chick.
To feed the chick, the parent rises from brooding and stands over the chick, lowering its head close to the chick’s head. The parent opens its bill, and the chick inserts its head into the adult’s mouth. When a parent decides the feeding has ended, the parent raises her or his head or starts doing something else, such as cleaning the bill. As needed, the parent may place a foot on the neck of the chick and push it toward the ground. Sometimes, the parents may regurgitate food that falls to the ground, to be picked up and eaten. Often, feeding is followed by mutual allopreening between parent and chick, perhaps even intertwining necks or rubbing one another with head and neck.
In some cases, the chick jabs at a distinct red wattle on the parent’s neck, which seems to prompt the parent to feed the chick. (Both male and female Andean Condors have a similar neck wattle.) Chicks may also solicit food by flapping their wings. Another begging posture is crouching low, belly on their tarsi, chest close to the ground, wings outstretched, and head and tail tilted slightly upward.
Brooding occurs much less often for the following 2 weeks. Feeding times plummet to only once every 10 hours or less. At about 1 month after hatching, brooding continues only at night, and even that isn’t continuous. Before the chick reaches 2 months of age, all brooding has stopped, and feedings slow to just 5 per week. Throughout the rest of the nestling period, parents are at the nest less than 5% of daylight hours, and they’re not even near the nest about 75% of daylight hours.
When alone in the nest, chicks may sleep, preen their feathers, or simply sit while wide awake. They also engage in apparently playful exploration, leaping boisterously, flapping their wings, whirling and turning, and manipulating objects. They may pretend to capture any number of things — leaves, sticks, stones, bones, feathers — jabbing at things with their bills or their feet. Nest sites are often made bare by probing nestlings. As young as 6 weeks after hatching, chicks start to wander outside the cave entrance, often slipping, tripping, falling — which makes some cliff nests perilous.
Figure 17. Wikipedia photo: This puppet is being used to hand-feed a captive-bred California Condor chick. Description: California Condor Chick and mommy. Creator: San Diego Zoo, Ron Garrison. URL: Fish and Wildlife Service archive copy at the Wayback Machine. Public domain: This image or recording is the work of a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employee, taken or made as part of that person’s official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image is in the public domain. For more information, see the Fish and Wildlife Service copyright policy.
Fledging
By the time a condor chick fledges, it has already been roaming on foot outside of the nest cave. It has been exercising its wings extensively, often achieving lift-off for short distances, within an easy walk from the nest entrance. For that reason, fledging is defined as a flight that goes beyond walking distance (more than 66–722 feet, 20–300 m) — far enough to require the chick to fly back to the nest entrance. Using this definition, California Condor chicks fledge about 5–6 months (165–220 days) after hatching, often with no parents present at the time. A condor chick may take a first flight then not take a second for a few days, continuing to walk to move around.
The first flights are typically clumsy, with a lot of energetic flapping, feet dangling, and uncontrolled landings, even crash-landing. Improvement is slow, and landings can still be challenging after 4 months of flying. Over time, crash landings are fewer, and controlled landings on cliff ledges and slopes are more reliable. Immature birds continue to depend on their parents for about an additional 6 months or more. As they move toward independence, they follow their parents to the foraging grounds and hang out with them near carcasses. At the carcass, they may feed themselves, but they’re easily displaced by other scavengers. Over an additional 6 months or so, they are increasingly able to deal with competing scavengers, so they don’t rely on parental feedings. Even so, for their first 2 years, juveniles stay near their natal territory and foraging grounds.
Figure 18. Even after California Condor youngsters fledge and can feed themselves for the most part, they continue to stay near their parents and to rely on them.
California Condors take at least 6 years, often up to 8 years (both males and females), to reach sexual maturity in the wild, and full adult coloration takes place at about the same time. The average generation length is 17.4–19 years.
Reproductive Success, Life Span, Survival
No data are known about the lifetime breeding success of California Condors. On a per-clutch basis, the likelihood of an egg surviving to fledge was 40–50% historically (in the 1980s). Data on the reintroduced condors suggest that the likelihood of a wild-laid egg successfully surviving to complete its first year is about 34%. It has been suggested, however, that reproductive success may differ once more wild-born condors are breeding. Though it has been difficult to assess, researchers estimate that about 50–80% of these California Condor adults are breeding, a range that seems comparable to the normal breeding effort for other vulture species.
Among adult California Condors, annual survival is about 92%, but a crude estimate of the actual survival rate of reintroduced condors 1992–2009 was 62%. The current reproductive success of California Condors isn’t adequate to sustain the population, let alone increase it, without the help of captive-breeding programs paired with reintroductions and the management of wild populations. If a California Condor survives to adulthood, it is likely to live 15.5–45 years, and it may live up to 60 years or more, much like Andean Condors.
“The longest-held captive California Condor, Topa Topa, who was taken into captivity when he was a juvenile, has survived 47 yr in captivity and is still successfully fathering chicks (USFWS unpublished data).” https://birdsoftheworld.org/bow/species/calcon/cur/demography#lifespan
Figure 19. In captivity, California Condors have long life spans; in the wild, however, these condors die all too often after being poisoned by hunters’ lead ammunition (bullets or shot), which they consume incidentally while feeding on carrion.
Historical threats to California Condor survival were chiefly lead poisoning due to their ingestion of lead bullets and bullet fragments and lead shot found in carrion, as well as to active persecution of them by humans. Sadly, humans continue to persecute these vultures; since 1998, long after these condors have been protected, 11 have been shot dead, and others have survived being shot, as evidenced by incidental radiography (e.g., to investigate an injury).
Currently, lead poisoning continues to threaten condor survival, despite educational campaigns and some protective legislation. As one example, a 2009 assessment of condors released into Arizona revealed that more than 90% of them still tested positive for lead; three years later, a study found that lead poisoning continued to be the leading identifiable cause of deaths in juvenile and adult condors. Studies of condor feathers (which reveal lead exposure) showed that their lead levels rose as they relied less on the provisioned (lead-free) food and more on wild carrion. During 1992–2009, lead poisoning caused 26% of juvenile mortalities and 67% of adult mortalities of California Condors, and it’s thought that those are underestimates, due to the difficulty of determining causality in many instances, as well as the deaths of condors whose corpses weren’t retrieved for necropsy.
“In 2015, Bruce Rideout, director of the wildlife disease laboratories for San Diego Zoo Global, indicated that lead poisoning is the most common cause of death for juvenile and adult condors in the wild” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_condor#Lead_poisoning ).
Sadly, California Condors continue also to suffer from exposure to the long-banned pesticide DDT, after feeding on California Sea Lions who have accumulated these toxins during their lifetime, before the DDT ban. Among nestlings, microtrash (fragments of glass, plastic waste, wires) has been the leading cause of death (causing 73% of documented mortalities in one study), though it isn’t fatal for adults.
Conservation and Management
According to the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, the California Condor is CR, Critically Endangered. During the 20th century, the numbers of these condors in the wild plummeted, due mostly to lead poisoning, but also to agricultural pesticides (e.g., DDT), poaching and persecution, and habitat destruction. By 1979, only 27 California Condors (14 females, 13 males) were still alive. Scientists and conservationists, with the support of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), made the radical decision to capture every single surviving condor from the wild and put them all into captive-breeding programs.
Captive Breeding
In 1982, a wild condor nestling was taken from the wild to join a captive condor already held at the Los Angeles Zoo (since 1967). From then until 1987, conservationists removed eggs (in hopes of encouraging parents to lay additional eggs), as well as adults, from the wild. By 1987, the last of the 22 still-living wild condors was captured and transferred to captive-breeding programs at the San Diego Zoo’s Safari Park (then the Wild Animal Park) and the Los Angeles Zoo, both within the condor’s existing territory. In 1993, the Peregrine Fund (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Peregrine_Fund ) joined the captive-breeding program and coordinates these programs. Currently, the Oregon Zoo and the Chapultepec Zoo in Mexico City also participate in captive breeding.
Figure 20. In the 1980s, conservationists took the drastic step of capturing all living California Condors and engaging in a vigorous captive-breeding program to protect these condors from extinction.
The first California Condor chick hatched in 1988 at the San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park (now Safari Park). By the late 1990s, close to 20 chicks were being raised successfully at the three facilities (San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park, Los Angeles Zoo, and Peregrine Fund’s facility) altogether.
With only 22 founding California Condors, genetic diversity is a key concern. Through Species Survival Plans, the ornithologists and keepers who supervise the captive-breeding program do all they can to work toward as much genetic diversity as possible. First, they did genomic analysis (“DNA fingerprinting”) of all 22 condors and evaluated their genetic similarity. Then they preferentially mated condor pairs who were the most genetically divergent from one another. The only exceptions to this rule have been when these “prearranged marriages” didn’t result in any fertile eggs. They then selected the next-best possible mates for each condor.
When nestlings are reared together, they are often averse to mating with one another, regardless of their genomes. To minimize the chances that nestlings will be averse to a particular prospective mate once they reach sexual maturity, nestlings were initially sorted into same-sex groups. Better still, each condor chick is now reared away from all other chicks until about 6 months of age (about when they fledge).
Captive-breeders consider each condor’s genotype not only at each captive-breeding facility, but also at each reintroduction site, where it’s assumed that the reintroduced birds will choose their own mates from among those in the area. Delightfully, a 2021 study found that these condors showed a surprising degree of genomic diversity, and further genomic analysis is continuing, including study of the 22 founders. A glitch or two that resulted in genetic anomalies were analyzed, and once a faulty allele was identified, subsequent matings eliminated mate pairings that led to the problem.
Figure 21. California Condor pairs are carefully chosen for genetic diversity, to minimize genetic anomalies resulting from genetic mismatches.
According to the IUCN Red List (https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/22697636/181151405 ), the most current data indicate that 237 California Condors are in managed care at 10 holding institutions in 2 countries (presumably Mexico and the United States). These include 107 males, 94 females, and 36 unsexed (presumably not yet adults) California Condors.
To boost reproductive rates, keepers practice what’s known as double-clutching. In double-clutching, the keepers remove the first egg a mother lays, and they hand-rear that chick. Afterward, the mother lays a second egg, which she is allowed to rear herself. Studies have shown that both eggs and chicks resulting from double-clutching have comparable survival rates.
In 2024, the Los Angeles Zoo reported record-setting reproductive success (17 California Condor chicks in one year; cf. 20/year in 3 locations) by using a new technique. While using double-clutching, the keepers obtained two or three condor eggs, but instead of hand-rearing the hatchlings, they introduced these chicks to a surrogate mature condor, who raised them to maturity. The zoo plans to release all 17 chicks into the wild.
Figure 22. It has taken extraordinary effort to try to save California Condors from the brink of extinction. This condor seems to be saying it’s worth the effort.
Reintroduction: Releases to the Wild
In 1991, the captive-breeding program had successfully increased condor numbers enough that it was deemed safe to reintroduce some into the wild. The chosen mature birds were carefully reintroduced into the wild, with continuing monitoring and safeguarding, as needed. (To see how Andean Condors helped out, please see https://bird-brain.org/2026/08/09/new-world-vultures-part-2/#CACO .) Initially, they were released into two territories: one group in California and one in Arizona. Each territory was to receive 150 condors, starting with at least 15 known breeding pairs. About 30 more condors are released each year. In addition to the USFWS, reintroductions are managed by Ventana Wildlife Society, Peregrine Fund, Pinnacles National Park, and the government of Mexico.
In 2003, the first wild-hatched nestling fledged. In 2007, a California Condor egg was laid in Mexico, the first to be laid there since the 1930s or even earlier. In 2009, when a second chick, hatched in the wild in Sierra de San Pedro Mártir National Park, Baja California, Mexico, conservationists named it “Inyaa” (meaning “Sun” in Kiliwa, a Yuman indigenous language of Baja California). During 2010, the wild population of condors reached 100 in California, as well as 73 more in Arizona. In 2015, more condors were born in the wild than those who died that year. In 2016, the USFWS officially reported a global population of 446 California Condors: 170 captive condors and 276 wild condors.
Initial releases revealed some potential problems with reintroducing captive-bred condors into the wild. The USFWS realized that they needed to train condors to be averse to humans and to human-made structures, to prevent their engaging in potentially dangerous behavior. For instance, they trained them using painful but not deadly electrified simulated structures, and they isolate them from humans throughout captive rearing. In addition, management practices include continuing monitoring and use of aversive techniques whenever problematic behavior appears, such as by hazing condors who approach roadkill on a busy roadway.
Figure 23. If this California Condor was going to be released into the wild, it would undergo rigorous aversion training to avoid deadly human-made infrastructure such as power lines.
The USFWS also realized that they needed to do more to mimic the ways in which wild condors raised their young when rearing condors in captive settings. Whenever feasible (given financial and other constraints), captive pairs are moved into naturalistic enclosures to rear their offspring. In addition, more realistic hand-puppets are used for feeding hand-reared condor chicks. (When I was volunteering at the San Diego Zoo, one of my jobs was to repair condor hand puppets, repairing the realistic feather ruff and the leather parts, which condor chicks apparently attack ferociously at times.) Before being released, captive-bred condor juveniles are socialized by being housed with subadult condor “mentors.”
Interventions and Management
Sadly, lead poisoning, the leading cause of condor mortality, continues to kill too many California Condor adults and juveniles. Conservationists are using several strategies to try to mitigate this danger. For wild condors, testing of blood-lead levels must be done regularly. When lead levels are high, the poisoned condors are sent to the Oakland Zoo, which treats condors with lead poisoning by chelating the blood to remove the lead. In addition, it’s hoped that supplemental feedings may lessen condors’ dependence on carrion, which may be contaminated with lead ammunition. An additional benefit of feeding stations is that condors who visit these feeding stations may also be monitored more closely and trapped, as needed.
Some additional interventions and management practices include
aversion training for condors to avoid power lines and similar infrastructure
soliciting power companies to bury power lines and to insulate any above-ground lines in condor territory
hazing of condors who engage in inappropriate behaviors, such as approaching humans, human-made buildings and infrastructure
vaccinating nestlings against west Nile virus and other pathogens, as much as possible
reduction of trash in and around condor nesting areas
treating condors with Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) and introducing a vaccination program for this virus, though condors have survived at least one strain
habitat conservation (e.g., preserving 240,000 of 270,000 acres of wildlands at Tejon Ranch), preservation, and restoration
A 2024 report by the USFWS celebrated a world population of 569 California Condors. (A separate report proclaimed that 141 of the reintroduced condors were 8 years old or older, the age of sexual maturity, and 93 of those condors had produced viable offspring, as of 2020.) Unfortunately, because the number of deaths are still exceeding the number of condors who survive to reach 1 year of age, the wild population is still threatened and would not survive without continuing to be bolstered by the captive-breeding and reintroduction programs, as well as monitoring and management of the wild populations (e.g., medical and behavioral interventions, as needed). Conservationists and others hope that within a century, this species will become viable without needing intervention.
In addition, conservationists have tried to restrict the use of lead ammunition, through outreach and educational programs to inspire hunters to voluntarily comply in avoiding lead ammunition, as well as through legislation to restrict its availability and use. Programs have been initiated to provide hunters with free lead-free ammunition — available from Ventana Wildlife Society, Arizona Game and Fish Department, and Utah Division of Wildlife Resources. Thus far, these efforts have not succeeded in lowering rates of lead poisoning. In 2013, California passed legislation banning lead-based ammunition altogether, but the full implementation didn’t go into effect until 2019. Results are not yet known, but enforcement limitations may impede its effects until lead-based ammunitions are made unavailable entirely, throughout the nation.
Education programs also aim to inform the public about the benefits of condors and to appeal to people not to persecute these magnificent vultures. Research continues to find ways to mitigate the poisoning of California Condors by lead bullets and lead shot. So far, the most effective strategies seem to be regular monitoring for lead poisoning (in both blood and feathers), along with clinical treatment for it (chelation of the blood). As free-flying populations increase, this strategy becomes less efficacious and more challenging; it’s not a realistic long-term solution. Much more efficacious would be to find ways to prevent hunters and others from using lead ammunition and switching to nontoxic ammunition instead. Though California’s statewide ban may help somewhat, until there is national legislation, it’s far too easy for California-based hunters to obtain lead ammunition from outside California.
Figure 24. Conservationists have realized that to eliminate the main cause of California Condor mortality — poisoning by lead ammunition — they will need national legislation banning it entirely. Half-way measures aren’t even achieving half of the desired effects.
Less problematic but still a cause for concern is the contamination of marine mammals with harmful chemical substances, which the condors ingest when eating the carcasses of these mammals.
Like most other wildlife, California Condors are also affected by habitat loss and degradation. As humans continue to encroach on wild lands, the condor’s territory shrinks and may reach unsustainably small sizes.
Relationship with Indigenous Peoples
The California Condor has been important to many of the indigenous peoples of California and other areas in its range. Among the indigenous California tribes are the Wiyot, which viewed the California Condor as a creative force; the Mono, which viewed it as a destructive force; the Yokuts, which viewed it as key to the lunar cycle and lunar eclipses; and the Chumash, who believe its black feathers came from its being too close to a fire.
The Yurok tribe of northern California has played a critical role in reintroducing the California Condor (“prey-go-neesh” in Yurok) to Redwood National Park. In 2022, the first condor brought to this site was a mentor bird, named “Paaytoqin” (“Come back” in the Nez Perce language; less romantically, #736). As a mentor bird, Paaytoqin’s calm, pleasing disposition serves as a role model for younger condors, helping them to establish a social hierarchy within their pre-release housing. The condors released from there have these Yurok names: “Poy’-we-son” (“the one who goes ahead,”), “Nes-kwe-chokw” (“He returns”), “Ney-gem’ ‘Ne-chweenkah’” (“She carries our prayers”), and “Hlow Hoo-let” (“At last I [or we] fly!”). By the end of 2024, 18 condors had been reintroduced there.
Historically, condors have been found related to Native Americans, such as condor bones found in graves, feathers found in headdresses, and paintings of condors in caves. Evidence of ritual killing of condors exists for the Miwok, Patwin, Luiseño, and Pomo tribes, but it’s not known how many condors were actually killed.
Observations
The Cornell Lab of Ornithology gathers information from observers around the world through the eBird app and website (https://ebird.org/species/calcon? ), which holds 19,629 observations, 6197 with photos, and 7 with audio recordings. The lab’s Macaulay Library website (https://search.macaulaylibrary.org/catalog?taxonCode=calcon ) holds 19,685 photos, 7 audio recordings, and 124 videos of this species. In addition, iNaturalist gathers observations with its app and its website (https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?taxon_id=4778 ), which holds 6,604 observations, each of which includes a photograph, audio recording, or video.
Figure 25. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s eBird app and website currently holds more than 19,000 observations of wild California Condors (only 2 from San Diego), thousands with photos.
References
California Condor, Gymnogyps californianus
Elphick, Jonathan. (2014). The World of Birds. Buffalo, NY: Firefly Books.
Lovette, Irby, & John Fitzpatrick (Eds.), (2016). The Cornell Lab of Ornithology Handbook of Bird Biology (3rd ed.). Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
Winkler, David W., Shawn M. Billerman, and Irby J. Lovette. (2015). Bird Families of the World: An Invitation to the Spectacular Diversity of Birds. Barcelona: Lynx, Cornell Lab of Ornithology.
Shaw, George, Nodder, Frederick Polydore, Nodder, Elizabeth R., Nodder, Richard Polydore, McMillan, Buchanan, & Leach, William Elford. (1789). The Naturalist’s Miscellany (Vol. 9). Printed for Nodder & Co. https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/40319072
Gotch, A. F. [Arthur Frederick]. Birds—Their Latin Names Explained (348 pp.). Poole, Dorset, U.K.: Blandford Press.
Gruson, Edward S. (1972). Words for Birds: A Lexicon of North American Birds with Biographical Notes (305 pp., including Bibliography, 279–282; Index of Common Names, 283–291; Index of Generic Names, 292–295; Index of Scientific Species Names, 296–303; Index of People for Whom Birds Are Named, 304–305). New York: Quadrangle Books.
Lederer, Roger, and Carol Burr. (2014). Latin for Bird Lovers: Over 3,000 Bird Names Explored and Explained (224 pages). Portland, OR: Timber Press.
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