Con esta entrega, la Dirección General de Zoológicos y Vida Silvestre, organización que opera el Zoológico de Chapultepec, se ha convertido en el más reciente socio del programa para recuperación del Cóndor de California. Dicho programa tiene 27 años en operación y es administrado por el U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services. Antonio Graza, embajador de Estados Unidos en México, realizó la entrega oficial de los dos cóndores al Jefe de Gobierno capitalino Marcelo Ebrard Casaubo.

“La participación del zoológico de Chapultepec hará posible la concientización pública sobre los esfuerzos para conservar al Cóndor de California en México”, afirmó Steve Thompson, gerente de operaciones del USFWS en California y Nevada. “Este programa es un ejemplo perfecto de una exitosa participación binacional y le damos la bienvenida al Zoológico de Chapultepec al Programa de Recuperación del Cóndor de California.”

México ha sido parte del programa desde el 2002, año en que se liberaron varios cóndores en la Sierra de San Pedro Mártir en Baja California, sin embargo esta es la primera vez documentada que un zoológico mexicano cuenta con cóndores de California. Por muchos años, el zoológico de Chapultepec ha trabajado diligentemente con cóndores de los Andes, los primos suramericanos de la especie californiana.

“La llegada de los Cóndores de California al Zoológico de Chapultepec representa una gran responsabilidad y a la vez una gran oportunidad para dar a conocer (a los más de 5 millones de visitantes al año) esta especie que se extinguió en vida libre y que gracias a los esfuerzos de los Estados Unidos y de México, se logró mantener viva en cautiverio para su posterior reintroducción en su lugar de origen en ambos países”, comentó Fernando Gual Sill, director general de la Dirección General de Zoológicos y Vida Silvestre de la Ciudad de México.

El San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park envió dos cóndores, un macho nacido en el Wild Animal Park en 1993 y un segundo macho que nació en Los Angeles Zoo en 1996. El plan inicial es que los cóndores sean emisarios de la conservación, conforme los visitantes al zoológico los observan por primera vez. Más adelante se vislumbra la posibilidad de que el Zoológico de Chapultepec también opere como una unidad de reproducción. Actualmente se cuenta con cuatro instalaciones para la reproducción de los Cóndores de California, incluyendo el Wild Animal Park, los zoológicos de Los Ángeles y Oregon, así como The Peregrine Fund’s Center for Birds of Prey en Boise, en Idaho.

“El envío de estos cóndores al zoológico de Chapultepec es un paso más de colaboración entre Estados Unidos y México, en nuestro esfuerzo para asegurar la sobrevivencia de esta especie en crítico peligro de extinción”, dijo Michael Mace, responsable de aves en el San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park. “La siguiente fase consiste en ayudar al Zoológico de Chapultepec a desarrollar un centro de reproducción y entrenar al personal que lo maneje, con la esperanza de criar cóndores en ese zoológico para futura reintegración a la vida silvestre en Baja California.”

El Programa de Recuperación del Cóndor de California opera a base de sociedades de iniciativa pública y privada. El programa de recuperación está a cargo del U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service en cooperación con la Zoological Society of San Diego, Los Angeles Zoo, The Peregrine Fund, Oregon Zoo, y socios mexicanos que incluyen el Instituto Nacional de Ecología, la Comisión Nacional de Áreas Naturales Protegidas y el Centro de Investigación Científica y de Educación Superior de Ensenada, y ahora también la Dirección General de Zoológicos y Vida Silvestre, entre otros.

The Dirección General de Zoológicos y Vida Silvestre, which operates the Chapultepec Zoo “Alfonso L. Herrera,” became the newest member of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s 27-year-old California Condor Recovery Program as U.S. Ambassador Antonio Garza presented the condors to Mexico City Mayor Mare Marcelo Ebrard Casaubon.

“The Chapultepec Zoo’s participation will greatly increase the public awareness of California condor conservation efforts in Mexico,” said Steve Thompson, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) California and Nevada operations manager. “This program is an example of a truly successful binational partnership, and we welcome the Chapultepec Zoo to the California Condor Recovery Program.”

Although Mexico has been a partner in the recovery program since 2002 when the Sierra de San Pedro Mártir condor release site in Baja California, Mexico became operational, this is the first documented California condor in any of Mexico’s zoos. The Chapultepec Zoo has, however, worked diligently with Andean condors, the larger South American cousin of the California species, for many years.

“The arrival of the California condors to the Chapultepec Zoo represents a great responsibility and at the same time a great opportunity to present (to more than five million visitors a year) this species that once became extinct in the wild,” said Fernando Gual Sill, M.V.Z. M.Sc., Dirección General de Zoológicos y Vida Silvestre de la Ciudad de Mexico general director. “Thanks to the efforts of the United States and Mexico, this species was kept alive in zoos for a future reintroduction to its native habitat in both countries.”

The San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park sent two condors, one male hatched at the Wild Animal Park in 1993 and a second male hatched at the Los Angeles Zoo in 1996. The initial plan is for the birds to act as conservation education emissaries as visitors to the Chapultepec Zoo observe the birds for the first time. In the future, the Chapultepec Zoo may also become a breeding facility. Currently there are four facilities breeding California condors, including the Wild Animal Park, Los Angeles and Oregon zoos and The Peregrine Fund’s Center for Birds of Prey in Boise, Idaho.

“Sending California condors to the Chapultepec Zoo is another collaborative step between the United States and Mexico in our attempts to insure the survivorship of a critically endangered species,” said Michael Mace, Wild Animal Park curator of birds. “The next phase includes working together to assist the Chapultepec Zoo staff in developing a breeding center and cross training staff with the hope of raising condors at the zoo for future release in Baja California.”

The female bird flew from the California condor release site in the Sierra San Pedro de Martír National Park in Baja California, Mexico along the Sierra Juarez mountain ridge Tuesday. She flew past the U.S. border along the Jucumbra Mountains Wednesday and was last documented in the Anza-Borrego area through GPS. Condor 321 was hatched at the San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park and released in 2005.

The Zoological Society of San Diego, in cooperation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Mexican government, began a reintroduction program in Baja California, Mexico in 2002 led by Dr. Wallace through the center for Conservation and Research for Endangered Species (CRES), the Zoological Society’s research division. With condor 321 now in the U.S., 10 condors are flying free in Mexico, with five birds waiting for release next month.

California condors disappeared from Mexico in 1937. The goal of the California Condor Recovery Program is to establish two independent populations of California condors. Condors released in Central California and the Baja California birds are expected to eventually become one population. To date, the Central California birds have flown as far south as the San Bernardino mountains. The second population of birds is being established in Arizona.

The public can help researchers if a sighting is made by e-mailing the location of the condor, its identifying tag number, and what the bird was doing to the Zoological Society at condors@sandiegozoo.org. However, it is important to note that the California condor is a critically endangered species and is protected by the federal government. The public should not interact with it or inhibit its actions. Human interaction can interfere with its return to San Diego’s wilderness.

On March 24, biologists in Mexico discovered another momentous milestone, the first California condor egg laid in Mexico since their reintroduction.

On release day, October 10, 2002, she was struck several times by golden eagles as she attempted to fly. Discouraged, she hid in the chaparral overnight and flew conservatively, but well, in the morning. Her nervous flight took her 12 miles (20 kilometers) to the south, where she had to be rescued 2 weeks later.

Her subsequent release the following spring went well. She was favored to be the first to breed with the dominant male W61 when she incurred a foot injury. This was possibly caused from an eagle strike since her nervous behavior made her a target whenever they were around. As a result of her injury, her social status dropped and he eventually selected a different female as a mate. She contracted lead poisoning in the fall of 2007 and was successfully treated at the San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park. She is scheduled for re-release as soon as permits allow.

Xewe was shot at several times near Pyramid Lake in Southern California, but thankfully was not hit. She and seven others were later re-captured in 1994 because they began using power poles as perches. This dangerous habit was curtailed in condors that were released after Xewe through power pole aversion training. In captivity, she became a model mentor of young birds in pre-release pens at Ventana, Hopper, and Baja release sites. If all goes as planned, she will be released to the wild in Baja sometime in 2008.

What continues my 30-year fascination with this highly endangered species is its intelligence and social behavior. Like primates or social carnivores, each bird has a specific ranking within the pecking order of the local population. This social status is based on age, experience, sex and physical attributes like weight and physical ability. Condors are all about conserving energy and an ordered social hierarchy reduces the amount of time individuals spend in altercations over resources. While continuous, mild, non-violent displacements occur throughout the day by dominant birds towards subordinates over resources such as food, perches and even air space, higher intensity aggression is usually seen only between two birds of nearly the same rank. Since every two to four days the birds return to the feeding sites, we can tally the winners and losers of their interactions and assess their hierarchal relationships from camouflaged blinds as they feed. By better understanding the social rules under which this gregarious species functions we gain predictability and can fine tune our captive rearing conditions and management for better behavioral results, and hopefully survivorship in released condors.

During our efforts to re-establish captive bred condors in Baja California, Mexico, that we have been conducting since 2002, I have had a chance to get a closer look at these social workings. What determines a bird’s status in the first place involves the parameters mentioned above, yet an individual’s social position is not cast in stone. So a big question is what are the social rules and environmental conditions that allow a bird to increase (or decrease) its social status?

To establish a condor population in an area they once inhabited we, in effect, train them to a site with behavioral management, food and topographic features that will enhance their ability to become competent flyers and learn how to function as condors in their new “wild” environment. Since they are completely dependent on us for food and water, as they would be with their parents for an extended period of months after fledging, we provide large animal carcasses in and immediately outside the release pen where they can watch the smaller scavengers and previously released condors feed.

Condors rely heavily on each other, particularly more experienced birds to consistently find food. Not having the olfactory ability of the smaller turkey vulture, condors use observation of the activities and behavior of the more numerous smaller scavengers as well as other condors to find a carcass. Historically they also had the benefit of learning the tried and true foraging traditions that developed over centuries in their local population that would indicate where food was likely to show up in any given period of the year within their potential foraging distance of several hundred miles. As expected, it is taking decades for our released condors to develop a functional food finding tradition in areas we are attempting to re-establish them. To manage the process we subsidize the inexperienced population with carrion proffered at various times and locations in their environment thus encouraging natural foraging.