Birds
California Condor
Gymnogyps californianus · also called condor
The California condor is a giant vulture that was rescued from the very edge of extinction. In 1987 the entire species was 22 birds, all in cages. Today more than 300 fly free over the mountains and coast of the American West — one of the most intensive and expensive recovery efforts ever attempted for a single species.
Overview
Historically the California condor ranged across much of North America, feeding on the carcasses of the continent’s large mammals — and, along the Pacific coast, on beached whales and seals. As the megafauna disappeared and human persecution rose, its range collapsed to a strip of southern California by the 20th century. Reintroduced populations now exist in the mountains and central coast of California, the Grand Canyon area of Arizona and Utah, and Baja California, Mexico.
A soaring giant
With a wingspan close to three metres, the California condor is the largest flying land bird in North America. It is built for soaring rather than flapping: it launches from a cliff or a high perch, finds a rising column of warm air or a wind deflected off a ridge, and rides it for hours, scanning huge areas of ground for carcasses and covering hundreds of kilometres in a day with almost no effort. The bare head — which flushes colour with mood — stays clean while feeding inside a carcass.
The collapse and the rescue
Shooting, poisoning (from strychnine baits and later lead), egg collecting, and lead poisoning drove the decline. By 1982 only 22 condors remained, and their numbers were still falling. Conservationists took the drastic step of capturing every wild bird for a captive-breeding programme, completed in 1987.
Captive breeding at the San Diego and Los Angeles zoos, using techniques like removing eggs to induce females to re-lay, slowly rebuilt the population, and releases began in 1992. Released birds are radio- and GPS-tagged, provisioned with lead-free carcasses, tested and treated for lead, and taught to avoid power lines using mock poles.
Reproduction
Condors are slow breeders — a pair produces one egg every one to two years, incubates it for about two months, and cares for the single chick for more than a year, so the young bird cannot breed itself until it is six to eight years old. This makes population growth inherently slow and every death costly.
Status
The California condor is Critically Endangered but increasing. The total population passed 560 in the 2020s, with over half flying wild, and wild-fledged chicks are now part of the count. The species is not yet secure: lead poisoning remains the dominant cause of death and the chief barrier to a self-sustaining wild population, and management — feeding, monitoring, and medical treatment — is still required everywhere condors fly.
California Condor: common questions
How close did the California condor come to extinction?
As close as a species can get. Centuries of shooting, poisoning, egg collecting, and habitat loss reduced it to a tiny remnant, and by 1982 there were only 22 California condors left on Earth. Rather than watch them die out, biologists made the controversial decision to trap every single wild bird, and the last free-flying condor was captured in April 1987 — the species then existed only in captivity, at the San Diego and Los Angeles zoos.
How is the recovery going?
Slowly but genuinely. Captive breeding — including "double clutching," where removing the first egg prompts the female to lay another — built the numbers up, and releases began in 1992. By the mid-2020s there were more than 560 condors in total, over half of them flying free in California, Arizona, Utah, and Baja California, and wild pairs are successfully raising chicks. The species is still Critically Endangered and the wild population is not yet self-sustaining without ongoing management.
What is still killing California condors?
Lead. Condors feed on carcasses and gut piles left by hunters, and fragments of lead bullets in that meat are extremely toxic — lead poisoning is the leading cause of death in wild condors and the main obstacle to a self-sustaining population. Conservationists routinely test and treat ("chelate") wild birds for lead, and California banned lead ammunition for hunting statewide in 2019. Other threats include collisions with power lines (young condors are trained to avoid them), microtrash they swallow and feed to chicks, and DDT contamination affecting the coastal population.
How can you tell a California condor from a turkey vulture?
Mainly size and the underwing pattern. A condor is enormous — nearly a 3-metre wingspan versus about 1.7 m for a turkey vulture — and holds its wings flat and steady when soaring, while a turkey vulture holds them in a shallow V and rocks. From below, an adult condor shows a large white triangle on the leading underside of each wing; a turkey vulture shows silvery flight feathers along the trailing edge. Adult condors also have a bare orange-pink head and, usually, a numbered wing tag.