Latest California Condor Stories

SACRAMENTO, Calif. _ As a wall of flames roared down the mountainside, a firefighter unfurled a protective tent over himself and discovered a chipmunk had scrambled into his fireproof shelter with him. After the danger passed, the chipmunk slipped away unscathed by last summer's Angora fire. Not all wildlife caught in wildfires are so lucky, said Cheryl Millham, director of the Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care Center. "The ones who can get through it are the ones who can run," said Millham, who...

By Daniel Lopez, The Monterey County Herald, Calif. Jul. 18--The Ventana Wildlife Society has established an emergency fund to help rebuild its condor sanctuary damaged by the Basin Complex Fire. Kelly Sorenson, the society's executive director, said the plan is for cleanup efforts to begin Tuesday at its facility in the Ventana Wilderness of the Los Padres National Forest. "We are gearing up for it," he said. Among the needed repair work is rebuilding breeding pens destroyed when...

By Lisa M. Krieger, San Jose Mercury News, Calif. Jul. 18--Two rare California condor chicks have survived the Big Sur-based Basin Complex fire, enduring dense smoke but untouched by flames. "We're ecstatic," said Kelly Sorenson of Ventana Wildlife Society, which monitors each bird along the vast central coast. "We're so incredibly relieved that two chicks survived." The fate of the third remains unknown. Unlike the two survivors, who lived in coastal nests, the nest of the third chick was...

By Lisa M. Krieger, San Jose Mercury News, Calif. Jul. 17--Two rare California condor chicks have survived the Big Sur-based Basin Complex fire, enduring dense smoke but untouched by flames. "We're ecstatic," said Kelly Sorenson of Ventana Wildlife Society, which monitors each bird along the vast central coast. "We're so incredibly relieved that two chicks survived." The fate of the third remains unknown. Unlike the two survivors, who lived in coastal nests, the nest of the third chick was...

The fate of three condor chicks born in April in the wild are currently unknown. The chicks play a critical role in California's reintroduction of the threatened species, which have a low breeding rate and lay eggs only once every two years. One nest was in the fire's path, and flames had spoiled an aviary where captive chicks are held and trained before being released into the wild."We have three mating condor pairs this year and three active nests that we are really concerned about....

By The Bakersfield Californian Jul. 4--A lot of conservationists know exactly how I feel about the uncertainty over of the future of the California condor. Despite the fact that I am also a hunter, I too, am a conservationist, and hopefully, my writings have shown that I do care about our wildlife, their management and habitat restoration, as well as our own environment. The vast majority of other hunters also feel the way I do, and we consider ourselves the keepers of everyone else's...

By Lisa M. Krieger, San Jose Mercury News, Calif. Jul. 2--One rare California condor chick may be dead and two others are in areas too dangerous to be saved, as the Big Sur-based Basin fire creeps into their once-serene canyons. "It is horrible, but there is nothing we can do," said Kelly Sorenson of Ventana Wildlife Society, which monitors each bird along the vast central coast. Thick smoke thwarted an attempted rescue Tuesday morning. "We're just waiting, watching and hoping for the...

Conservationists say a new law may help save endangered California condors by keeping lead ammunition out of their habitats. The measure, which goes into effect Tuesday, will require hunters to use only non-lead ammunition in the habitats. The California Legislature passed the measure last year because condors were being poisoned by swallowing lead bullets or fragments when they feed on carcasses of animals shot with the ammunition, Defenders of Wildlife said. The group said more than 276...

DENVER (AP) - The Denver Zoo has a newly hatched Andean condor, only the second condor to hatch at a zoo anywhere in the world over the past year, zoo officials said Thursday.The Denver condor, a male, hatched May 13. He and his parents are the zoo's only condors.Andean condors are an endangered species and came close to extinction in the 1970s, the zoo said. There are estimated to be only a few thousand of the giant birds in the wild, while 74 live in captivity in North America.When Denver's...

WASHINGTON -- The growing populations of harbor seals and sea lions along the West Coast may be good news for California condors. While condors are now best known for eating dead deer, cattle and other animals, new research shows that carcasses of marine animals once formed a large part of their diet. Some condors are already finding food in sea lion and seal rookeries that have been growing along the coast, reports Stanford University researcher Page Chamberlain. A large part of the condor's...