Pollution kills off attempt to save condor
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Your support makes all the difference.An attempt by US scientists to save the California condor from extinction and reintroduce the bird into the wild has ended in failure after the death of the first three chicks born outside captivity for 18 years.
The chicks were born in the mountains of the Los Padres National Forest, northwest of Los Angeles, about five months ago and were closely monitored under a $35m (£22m) reintroduction programme.
Over the past three weeks, all three died, just as they were about to take flight for the first time. Their deaths appear to be linked to pollution. The first one to be examined by scientists had high levels of copper in its body, while the second was found to have ingested a dozen bottle caps, shards of glass, electrical fixtures, screws and washers. A post-mortem examination is being performed on the third at San Diego Zoo.
The birth of the chicks was considered a breakthrough because they were the first birds from eggs laid and hatched in the wild since 1984. Their deaths have come as a big psychological blow to the scientists but their efforts will continue.
"It's an emotional loss and more of a step backward than we wanted," Bruce Palmer, co-ordinator of the California Condor Recovery Programme for the US Fish and Wildlife Service, told the Los Angeles Times.
Some of Mr Palmer's colleagues speculated that adult condors were attracted to the rubbish because it was brightly coloured and brought it back to the chicks' nesting cave thinking the caps and washers were bone fragments, which condors are known to eat.
It was human intrusion into wilderness areas that caused the California condor, America's largest bird, to slide towards extinction. Just 201 of them are now known to be living in California, Arizona and Mexico.
Scientists working on the recovery programme said they were optimistic that more chicks would be born in the wild next year.
They are considering increased monitoring of the next hatching, possibly including the use of close-up video surveillance.
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