California Condor Restoration--Conservation Projects
12 Jun 08
Goal:
Establish self-sustaining wild populations of California Condors through captive propagation, release, and management with the ultimate goal of removing the species from the Endangered Species List.
Humans nearly decimated the magnificent California Condor, North America’s largest flying land bird. The population numbered a mere 22 condors by 1982. With huge effort by numerous agencies including The Peregrine Fund, a remarkable recovery is under way, but this rare bird continues to suffer from a human-caused threat: lead poisoning.
Condors present a warning that fragments from lead bullets fired from a rifle are an environmental danger to scavenging wildlife, and also to humans. Our research shows that lead bullets fragment into dozens or hundreds of tiny pieces that disperse widely in an animal when it is shot. When condors consume animal remains, they ingest tiny fragments of lead, enough to cause them to become ill or die. Until this problem is solved, it is unlikely that condors can be established in the wild as a self-sustaining population.
Two more wild-hatched condor chicks joined the growing flock of California Condors in northern Arizona in 2008. The year marked a major milestone in condor restoration: for the first time since 1987, more California Condors were flying in the wild than were being held in captivity for breeding purposes. We are proud and encouraged by this sign that our efforts to save this species—once reduced to just 22 individuals—are succeeding.
In FY2008, there were 66 wild condors in Arizona, where our recovery project is focused, and more than a dozen awaiting release at our Vermilion Cliffs site. More than 50 captive condors at the World Center for Birds of Prey in Boise—the world’s largest captive flock—produced 11 chicks that will eventually join the wild population.
We partner with the Arizona Game and Fish Department and hunting organizations to offer hunters in northern Arizona a non-lead alternative to traditional ammunition in areas where we are restoring the California Condor. Throughout the condor’s range, landowners are proud to see these ancient scavengers returning to the sky. The condor has revealed the environmental effect associated with the toxicity of lead. The recovery of condors would bode well for other scavenger species that are similarly affected by toxic lead ammunition remains, such as Bald Eagles, Golden Eagles, and some mammals—including humans.
Although the harmful effects of ingesting lead are certain and spent ammunition is a known source of lead exposure in avian scavengers, collation of the evidence from diverse experts and additional study of this source of lead exposure in humans is needed to present the best available science to policy- and decision-makers. We organized a scientific conference of experts in this field of study in May 2008. For more information, see: Conference on Spent Lead Ammunition in Wildlife and Humans
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