The Condor Cave

While a tiny baby fuzzball is undeniably cute, we're pretty big fans of the larger fuzzballs too!

Zoom in for a closer look at this distinguished young California condor and its perfect hairdo. This bird is roughly a year old and is one of several untagged fledglings from last year's nests. Since these rapscallions are old enough to be exploring without their parents, the true identity of our charming friend remains a mystery for now.

Photo by Arianna Punzalan, FWS

For those who live in ‘Condor Country’, this one’s for you!

California condors are large, curious wild animals that explore their surroundings in search of food. At times, this behavior leads them to approach homes within their habitat, which can create dangerous situations for these endangered birds and cause damage to property. It is illegal to place food and water out to attract condors or other wildlife to your home. This is harmful to condors and can lead to serious behavioral issues that may result in their removal from the wild or even accidental death. Because condors are highly social birds, a single individual displaying undesirable behaviors can quickly influence others to learn the same behaviors.

If you live in ‘Condor Country’ here are some ways to keep your property and condors safe:

• Never feed or touch a condor.
• Spray water, yell, clap and make loud noises to scare away condors who may come near your property. Sometimes it takes persistence, but condors will move on if they are immediately and consistently hazed from the property. It may be exciting to have condors visit but allowing them to loiter will only make it more difficult to get them to leave.
• Remove or prevent access to open trash and recyclable containers, wires, seat cushions and drinkable water resources that may attract condors.
• Pick up “microtrash,” meaning small pieces of debris such as broken glass, bottle caps, can tabs, and other tiny, broken‑down items that condors may ingest. Adult condors can pick up these items around homes and feed them to their chicks, which can lead to starvation, stunted growth or death.
• If you see a condor that seems injured, lethargic, weak, or otherwise unwell please leave it be and contact us right away at [email protected].

California condors are protected by state and federal law, meaning no one is permitted to harm or kill California condors. However, residents can haze condors using the above methods to prevent them from perching on their homes and causing damage.

Photo by Shannon Sommer

Condor #816 poses perfectly, showing off her impressive 9.5 foot wingspan and snowy white underwing coverts.

Photo by Shannon Sommer

Happy Birthday T**a T**a!

We’re celebrating one of the founding birds in California condor conservation, T**a T**a, who turned 60 years old this month. 🎂

T**a T**a was originally recovered from the wild as a young fledging in Ventura County in 1967, the same year California condors were listed as endangered, by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and The Aububon Society. Weighing just 17 pounds and struggling to survive, he was transported to the L.A. Zoo for critical care. Although he regained strength, field observations revealed no adult condors nearby to guide him, which is essential for young condor survival. So a decision was made to return him to the L.A. Zoo where he lived under their care.

By 1982, only 22 condors survived in the wild, and to prevent the species’ extinction, the California Condor Recovery Program began capturing the remaining wild birds. Five years later, all remaining wild condors had joined T**a T**a in captivity in Los Angeles or down in San Diego. Together these condors, under the expertise of our zoological partners, launched the captive breeding program.

Today, T**a T**a’s lineage stands as a powerful testament to the success of the program. His genetic legacy includes roughly 300 birds, with about 100 currently contributing to the recovery effort as mentors or breeding condors, and 94 soaring free in the wild today.

The California Condor Recovery Program is an international program led by the USFWS in collaboration among many agencies and organizations. We thank our many partners dedicated to bringing this remarkable species back from the brink of extinction, including the L.A. Zoo where T**a T**a is still part of the breeding program.

Photos courtesy of L.A. Zoo

Just under 40 years ago, on April 19, 1987, the last wild condor was trapped at Bitter Creek National Wildlife Refuge and brought into captivity because condors were on an unswerving path towards extinction.

We were able to reverse that.

Now for the first time since that deadly decline condors number over 600. There is still work to be done to make condor populations self-sustaining, but our community is continuing to come together to make that a reality.

Here is a glimpse into the future, an untagged adult that was seen flying with members of the Southern California flock. The work of the California Condor Recovery Program will hopefully mean that this will be the norm and we can once again see this iconic species not just living, but thriving.

Photo by Riley Kimbrough, courtesy of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Egg-citing news from Condor Country!
We hope you are prepared for this egg-cellent update. Our eggs-pert Condor Team recently ventured into the Los Padres Forest back country and did what they egg-cel at: checking out condor nests. The team rappelled into our Pyramid Lake nest and was able to confirm that the pair, #856 and #976 were sitting on an egg in mid-stage of development and that's no yolk.
Our team is continuing to check on all of our nests so stay tuned for more eggs-traordinary news about our soon-to-be condor chicks. We hope you are all as eggs-tatic about it as we are.

And if you thought we had one more egg pun left, you were eggs-actly right!

Photos by Molly Murphy, Santa Barbara Zoo, courtesy of U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

🎶Wheeeen the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that's a carcass! 🎶

California condors 1249 and 811 have a playful moment with an intestine as they enjoy doing what they do best, making a carcass disappear.

Photo by Riley Kimbrough

Everyone!
We wanted to send you off into this beautiful spring weekend with some egg-cellent news. Yes, we announced six nests last week, but this just in - we officially have lucky number seven confirmed!
Who does this seventh nest belong to? The Pole Canyon Power Couple: #636 and #563. Condor biologists had been suspecting that there may be some nesting activity going for these two; the pair successfully fledged a chick in 2024, so it was definitely time for them to nest again this year, but even though the Condor Team was consistently signaling #563 in their nesting territory, she never showed her gorgeous pink head...until yesterday. Taking a much needed incubation break to stretch her wings, biologists were able to confirm that she was indeed nesting and that we have a new nest for the season! We wish them well in the upcoming nesting season and hopefully we'll have more updates on little fluffy chicks to come.

Photo by Laura McMahon, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Nesting season is in full swing, and our crew is busy trying to keep up with the secret lives of condor wives! So far we have six active nests, with at least one more pair expected to lay their egg any day now.

When possible, the team will enter nests to confirm the viability of the egg and set up a small, unobtrusive camera. This allows us to monitor the nest with minimal disturbance to the birds, providing valuable data on nesting success. Here we see condor #755 watching as his egg is carefully examined (it looked great!) and a camera is placed. After this brief interruption, he went right back to incubating.

Photos by Dave Meyer and Molly Murphy, SBZ