Yesterday I posted an image of a Whooping Crane colt. Today, we have a juvenile California Condor (the untagged one) and its father (tag # 19).

California Condors and Whooping Cranes are about as different as night and day (in more ways than just their color),
but the young whooper I posted yesterday, and this young condor have a couple of significant things in common. They’re both about 10 months of age as of today and they both represent hope for the future of their respective species.

To have photographed both young birds just a few weeks apart pretty much makes my year…and its only March :-).

Some info tidbits on these two species:

This young condor is just a couple of hundred yards from its nest and may never go farther than a couple of hundred miles away in its lifetime. By contrast, the young Whooping Crane’s journey to the spot where I photographed it was around 2,500 miles and it will make that trip twice per year for the rest of its life.

California Condors live up to 50 years. The oldest Whooping Crane on record was 28 years old.

The Whooping Crane is the tallest bird in North America at around 5 ft. The California Condor has the longest wingspan of any bird in North America at around 9.5 feet.

In 1941 there were 21 Whooping Cranes left in the world. The total number of California Condors reached a low of 22 in 1982.

As of 2022 the total wild Whooping Crane population was estimated at 702. The most current wild California Condor count is approximately 337. Both species are considered critically endangered.

Photographer note: Not the highest quality image here, due to distance from the subjects and pretty big crop. But the subject is compelling enough for posting.

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The top California Condor in this shot was coming in for a landing and apparently wanted the spot on which the bottom condor had been perched. So the lower condor politely vacated the premises.

At the time I took this shot, in Northern Arizona, on March 13, 2023, I had no idea that the avian flu had already struck the Arizona/Utah flock of California Condors. The first sick bird had been discovered just four days earlier on March 9.

Out of approximately 115 condors in the Utah-Arizona flock, a total of 21 died of the disease. To do the math for you, that’s about 18% of that flock and 6% of all 336 wild and free California Condors (there are still around 200 in captivity, some of which will be released at future dates).

Some estimates are that this event set the recovery effort for this species back a decade.

No deaths have been recorded since April and no more sick birds have been found. Encouragingly, a vaccine for the avian flu has been approved for use in California Condors, and trials have begun.

Condors are highly susceptible to contagious disease, because of their community roosting and their community feeding behaviors.

I don’t know if either or both of the two condors pictured here were part of the 20 who succumbed to the disease. I choose to think not.

Kudos to Bernie Boutin who figured out that I might be posting a Condor shot today.

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Earlier this year Avian Flu struck a flock of critically endangered California Condors. By mid-April, 20 birds (one out of every six in the northern Arizona/southern Utah flock) had died. The first sick birds were found only about three weeks after this shot was taken. Losing that many birds so suddenly set the recovery and reintroduction program back a decade.

Fortunately, no condors have been found sick or dead since April 11. So, for now, the crisis has ebbed.

The organizations which have worked together to reintroduce the condors had the foresight to consider the potential of contagious disease. Today condors have been reintroduced into geographically dispersed locations, the mountains of southern California north of the Los Angeles basin, the Big Sur vicinity of the central California coast, northern Arizona/southern Utah, and in the mountains of Baja California. This reduces the likelihood of an outbreak of disease threatening the entire population.

A bit of good news, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has approved emergency use of a vaccine to immunize against avian flu, which is being tested in vultures and will soon be given to three condors before proceeding to attempt to vaccinate all the flocks. That will be a monumental task but the people working to save the species will stop at nothing to protect them. And because of them, this condor can represent his species in echoing that song…”I Will Survive.”

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The bit of orange on its face indicates this bird is nearing maturity. Fully mature condors have a mottled orange head.
It's on a frequently used perch on the wall of Marble Canyon in Arizona.
I'm going random for the next week or so. Will be posting whatever I feel like every morning.

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No trip to Arizona would be complete for us without visiting the California Condors of Marble Canyon. Though still critically endangered, the population of California Condors has grown steadily from a low point of just 22 birds in 1982 to over 500 today, more than half of which are flying free in the wild.
This one was photographed hanging out on a bridge 467 feet above the Colorado River. Not the ideal setting, but hey...it's a California Condor.

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