How we brought the condor back from the brink | Michael Mace | TEDxDeExtinction

Summary

The California condor, once on the brink of extinction with only 22 birds left, has made a remarkable recovery through conservation efforts. The species, which coexisted with the likes of the saber-toothed cat, faced threats from human activities. A collaborative program involving zoos, utility companies, and wildlife services has successfully bred the condor in captivity and released them back into the wild. Innovative techniques like double-clutching and behavior modification have been employed to ensure the species' survival, with over 400 condors now living, more than half of them flying freely.

Takeaways

• 🦅 The California condor was nearly extinct, with only 22 birds left in 1987 due to human activities.
• 🌿 The condor is a Pleistocene-era species that survived alongside Harlan's giant sloth, the American mastodon, and the saber-toothed cat.
• 📉 The condor's habitat shrank from upstate New York and northern Florida to Vancouver to Baja Mexico due to European settlers.
• 🚫 The bird faced threats from contaminants like lead and DDT, electrocution, and collisions with power lines.
• 🛡️ The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service intervened, placing the remaining condors in zoos for protection and breeding.
• 🔬 Innovative conservation techniques, including double-clutching and puppet rearing, were employed to increase the population.
• 🧬 Genetic management was crucial, with every individual condor genetically mapped to prevent inbreeding.
• 🏥 West Nile virus posed a significant threat, but a vaccine was developed and administered to the condors.
• 🗑️ Microtrash ingestion was an underestimated problem, requiring surgery to remove items like bottle caps and pieces of glass from the condors.
• ♻️ Condors play an important ecological role by scavenging and cleaning up carcasses, which helps prevent the spread of harmful toxins.
• 💉 Lead poisoning from ingesting lead shot used in hunting was a significant threat, leading to efforts to reduce lead in the environment.

Q & A

What led to the near extinction of the California condor?

The California condor was pushed to the brink of extinction due to human activities, including contaminants like lead and DDT, electrocution, and collisions with power lines.

Why is the California condor significant in terms of evolutionary history?

The California condor dates back to the Pleistocene era and lived alongside now-extinct species like Harlan's giant sloth, the American mastodon, and the saber-toothed cat. It is the only one of these animals that has survived to the present day.

What was the main debate regarding the conservation of the condor in 1987?

The debate centered around whether to let the species die in dignity or intervene to prevent extinction, given that its decline was largely due to human-caused factors.

How did zoos contribute to the conservation of the condor?

Zoos like the San Diego Zoo Safari Park and the Los Angeles Zoo safeguarded the remaining condors in captivity, developed breeding programs, and employed techniques like double-clutching and using hand puppets to prevent human imprinting on chicks.

What is double-clutching, and how did it help increase condor reproduction?

Double-clutching is a technique where the first egg is removed and incubated, allowing the parents to raise a second egg. This increased the reproduction rate from one chick every two years to four chicks.

How was the issue of condor electrocution on power lines addressed?

Utility companies worked with conservationists to bury power lines in key areas. Condors were also trained using mock power poles with mild electric shocks to stop them from roosting on hazardous power structures.

What was the role of genetics in the condor recovery program?

Genetic mapping was used to manage the small population of condors and prevent inbreeding. This data helped in pairing condors for breeding and safeguarding genetic diversity.

What threat did West Nile virus pose to the condor population, and how was it mitigated?

West Nile virus killed several condors, but the Center for Disease Control developed a vaccine that was administered to all condors, requiring annual boosters to protect the population.

How is microtrash a danger to condors, and what behavior leads to its ingestion?

Condors often ingest microtrash, mistaking it for small pieces of bone they consume for calcium. This leads to serious health issues, including the need for surgery to remove the trash.

Why is it important to continue conservation efforts for species like the California condor?

Condors serve as environmental indicators, reflecting the health of the ecosystems we share with them. By listening to what these species reveal about the environment, we can make informed decisions to protect both wildlife and human well-being.

Outlines

00:00

🦅 The Condor's Journey to Near Extinction

The California condor faced near extinction with only 22 birds left due to human activities. Dating back to the Pleistocene era, the condor lived alongside species like the saber-toothed cat and the American mastodon. Despite surviving for 10,000 years, the bird was pushed to the brink of extinction due to threats like lead, DDT, and power line collisions. In 1987, a controversial decision was made to capture the last wild condors and house them in zoos, hoping to prevent their extinction while addressing the environmental issues causing their decline.

05:02

🧬 Innovation in Condor Conservation

Faced with the challenge of breeding California condors in captivity, conservationists pioneered new techniques, including double-clutching to increase reproduction rates. Using hand puppets to prevent human imprinting, they successfully raised condor chicks while preparing them for life in the wild. At the San Diego Zoo’s Center for Conservation Research, scientists also conducted detailed genetic mapping of the small population to prevent inbreeding and ensure the species’ long-term survival. They even developed a DNA-based method to determine the gender of chicks, crucial for managing the breeding program.

10:06

⚡ Teaching Condors to Avoid Power Lines

One of the significant threats to condors was electrocution from power lines due to their large wingspan. Conservationists worked with utility companies to modify the birds' behavior by using electrified mock power poles to deter them from dangerous structures. Over time, the condors learned to avoid roosting on hazardous poles, and utility companies began burying power lines in high-risk areas. Unexpected challenges, like the arrival of West Nile virus, required vaccinating the entire population, showing the complexity of maintaining the condor population in the wild.

🔬 The Threat of Microtrash and Lead Poisoning

Condors play a vital ecological role as scavengers, cleaning up carcasses and preventing the spread of diseases like botulism and anthrax. However, they face new threats from ingesting microtrash, small objects like bottle caps and plastic that require surgical removal. Another severe issue is lead poisoning from hunting ammunition. Although hunters contribute significantly to conservation efforts, condors ingest lead from carcasses, which is toxic to them. Efforts are underway to reduce lead exposure and address these environmental hazards.

💨 Adapting to Future Threats

With the rise of wind energy, there is concern that wind turbines could pose a threat to condors. Although no condors have yet been killed by turbines, other raptors have been affected. Researchers are working with energy companies to develop early detection systems and adjust turbine fields based on condor flight patterns. These collaborative efforts highlight the importance of anticipating and mitigating new threats to the species’ survival.

🌍 A Conservation Success Story

Thanks to collaborative conservation efforts, the California condor population has grown from 22 birds to over 400, with more than half flying free in the wild. Birds raised in captivity are now breeding in the wild, completing the life cycle without human intervention. Condors serve as environmental indicators, reflecting the health of ecosystems shared with humans. Their recovery demonstrates the potential for positive environmental change through dedicated conservation efforts.

Keywords

💡California condor

The California condor is the main subject of the video, a species that was pushed to the brink of extinction due to human activities. Once reduced to just 22 birds in 1987, the video discusses the efforts taken to save this large bird, which has a 9.5-foot wingspan and a life span of more than 60 years. The condor plays a critical ecological role as a scavenger.

💡Pleistocene

The Pleistocene epoch refers to a period from about 2.6 million to 11,700 years ago. In the video, it is mentioned that the California condor dates back to this era, surviving alongside prehistoric animals like the saber-toothed cat and mastodon. The fact that the condor survived for 10,000 years highlights the importance of saving this species from human-induced extinction.

💡Lead poisoning

Lead poisoning is identified as one of the major threats to the California condor's survival, resulting from the ingestion of lead fragments left in carcasses by hunters. Lead is toxic to condors and other wildlife, prompting efforts to remove lead from products like paint, gasoline, and hunting ammunition to reduce its environmental impact.

💡Conservation innovation

Conservation innovation refers to the creative and scientific methods employed to save the California condor from extinction. The video highlights strategies such as breeding programs, genetic mapping, and the development of hand puppets to prevent chicks from imprinting on humans. These innovations were crucial in successfully reintroducing the species to the wild.

💡Double-clutching

Double-clutching is a breeding technique used to increase the reproductive output of the California condor. By removing the first egg laid by the condor and placing it in an incubator, the parents are tricked into laying a replacement egg, thereby allowing the production of more offspring in a shorter period. This was essential for rapidly increasing the condor population.

💡Microtrash

Microtrash refers to small pieces of debris like bottle caps and plastic that condors inadvertently ingest, believing it to be bone. This debris accumulates in their bodies, requiring surgery to remove. The video highlights how this human-created waste poses a significant health risk to condors, reflecting the broader issue of environmental pollution.

💡Genetic management

Genetic management was a key aspect of the California condor recovery program. With only 22 birds left, each bird's genetic makeup was mapped to ensure diverse pairings and avoid inbreeding. This process was essential in maintaining the genetic health of the small population and ensuring a sustainable recovery of the species.

💡Power line collisions

Power line collisions were a significant cause of death for condors, due to their large wingspan and tendency to roost on power structures. To prevent this, utility companies collaborated with conservationists by burying power lines in key areas and implementing behavior modification techniques like mild electric shocks to dissuade condors from perching on dangerous structures.

💡West Nile virus

West Nile virus, which arrived in the U.S. in 1999, posed a new and unforeseen threat to the California condor population. Condors, like many bird species, were vulnerable to the virus, leading to the implementation of vaccination programs. This example underscores the unpredictable nature of species conservation efforts.

💡Environmental indicator

The California condor is described as an environmental indicator, meaning its health and survival reflect the broader state of the ecosystem it inhabits. By monitoring condor populations, scientists can assess the health of the environment they share with humans, emphasizing the interconnectedness of species survival and human well-being.

Highlights

The California condor was pushed to the brink of extinction with only 22 birds left in the world.

The condor dates back to the Pleistocene, surviving alongside now-extinct species like the giant sloth, American mastodon, and saber-toothed cat.

In 1987, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided to capture all remaining condors to prevent their extinction.

Condors are the largest flying birds in North America with a nine-and-a-half-foot wingspan and can live over 60 years.

Condors are a K-select species, meaning they have a slow reproductive rate, becoming sexually mature around five to six years of age.

Breeding innovations like 'double-clutching' allowed the conservation team to produce more chicks, helping boost condor numbers.

The use of hand puppets helped prevent chicks from imprinting on humans, ensuring they could be reintroduced to the wild.

Genetic mapping of the remaining 22 condors was crucial in ensuring genetic diversity and preventing inbreeding.

A new technique developed using DNA from eggshell membranes allowed researchers to determine the gender of the birds without waiting for sexual maturity.

To reduce electrocution, utility companies and conservationists worked together to train condors using mildly electrified mock power poles.

Lead poisoning from ingested ammunition was a major cause of condor deaths, leading to the development of lead-free alternatives for hunters.

Wind turbines, a new challenge for condors, prompted collaboration between conservationists and utility companies to create early detection systems to avoid collisions.

By 2024, the condor population had grown to over 400 birds, with more than half flying freely in California, Arizona, and Baja, Mexico.

Released condors have started reproducing naturally in the wild, completing the species' recovery cycle.

Condors serve as environmental indicators, showing the health of the shared ecosystems where humans and wildlife live.

Transcripts

Transcriber: Claudia Sender Reviewer: David DeRuwe

The California condor was pushed to the brink of extinction

when there were only 22 birds left in the world.

Imagine that!

22.

This was because of pressures put on by human activities.

The condor dates back to the Pleistocene.

So some of the animals that have been talked about today that lived in the day:

Harlan's giant sloth, the American mastodon, the saber-toothed cat.

The condor lived among those.

Can you imagine?

But it was the only one of them to survive to today.

After 10,000 years, fossil records show

that it was in upstate New York and northern Florida.

And then as European settlers pushed across the country,

its last stronghold was from Vancouver to Baja Mexico.

The condor is unique.

It's the largest flying bird in North America

with a nine-and-a-half foot wingspan - that's two feet more than this.

It lives more than 60 years.

As a K-select species, it has a slow reproductive rate.

And it's sexually mature about five to six years.

After those 10,000 years,

in 1987, there was a great debate.

The condor was declining at such a rapid rate,

there was fear of losing it to extinction.

It was from contaminants in the wild, such as lead and DDT,

and electrocutions and collisions with power lines and power polls.

On one hand, a group of people were saying,

"Let the species die in dignity."

On the other hand,

a group of people saying this was not a naturally occurring extinction,

and that we had a responsibility to intervene.

So after lawsuits and debates, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

took the bold step of safeguarding the condor

while some of these issues were being resolved by placing the remaining birds

in the San Diego Zoo Safari Park in Los Angeles Zoo.

After 10,000 years, the condor was extinct in the wild.

Now, you can imagine the weight on those two zoos

with given these birds to care for

and making sure they didn't go extinct on our watch.

We had to draw on a variety of resources.

We had to use what I call "Conservation innovation,"

literally writing the book as we were trying to save the species.

We had to draw on our own experience working with closely related species

like the Andean condor and other avian species.

But we had to quickly assemble a variety of resources and science.

We had to design and construct breeding centers like this one at the safari park.

This is a series of aviaries with nest chambers associated with it.

There were folks who said we would never be able to breed this species in a zoo.

The entire goal was always to release the bird back into the wild.

So we had to take certain steps as we progressed towards that.

We had to even design in the facility, you can see in this slide,

[concertina] wire on the top of the perimeter fence.

The reason for that is the debate was so contentious about condors

that people were threatening to break in

and release the condors back into harm's way.

I can remember spending a few nights myself out at the park,

making sure that didn't happen.

We had to employ techniques like double-clutching.

In the wild, a condor raises one chick every two years.

But by using this technique of double-clutching,

we removed the first egg

and placed it safely in an incubator

and then hatched it.

That allowed the parents to raise what's called a replacement egg.

So in that same two-year period,

we were able to produce four chicks instead of just one.

Now, we were concerned about the birds imprinting.

Again, the goal of releasing them back into the wild.

And so we developed hand puppets.

And just to the side on that hand puppet is one of our dedicated keeper staff,

working round the clock to feed and care for that chick.

That puppet became its lifeline:

It fed the chick,

it socialized with the chick,

and it played with the chick.

At some point in that chick's life, it is placed in an area

where it had the chance to look out through a portal and see other condors,

so that it starts to understand what it's going to be.

During this process - that's about six months from the time it's hatched

until the time it's fledged.

And sometimes when we fledge them

if they're not fledging with their parents,

they're fledging them with mentors.

Again the goal of reestablishing the species in the wild.

In our labs at the San Diego Zoo, Center for Conservation Research,

we had to make sure that we addressed the issues of genetics.

When the population was just at 22 birds, every individual was mapped genetically,

so we knew the relatedness to each other.

This was paramount when you're dealing with such a small population

because we know the effects of inbreeding with other species.

Once those identifiers were made, then we took computer models,

and we put all that data in there.

And then from there, the parents were determined.

Now fortunately, condors are very user-friendly this way.

When we put just two birds together, just based on data and not behavior,

most times they reproduced.

This was imperative.

Also in those same labs,

for the first time,

a process was developed to determine the gender of birds using DNA.

This was from membranes left in the hatched eggs.

This was really important for us also

as we started to establish those new pairings

that we were able to put them together at the appropriate ages

because otherwise we'd have to wait five or six years

to be sexually mature to know what genders they were.

Also, in genetically managing the population, we had to make sure

that as we established new breeding centers,

and we started to put birds back out

into various release sites in California, Arizona and Baja, Mexico,

that we wanted to replicate the genes,

so in the event there was a catastrophic event

like a wild fire or a disease outbreak, we had safeguarded all the genetic lines.

Now, some of the known factors that I mentioned with causing

the demise and decline of condors was the collision with power lines

and roosting on power structures.

Now you ask, "Roosting on a power structure, a lot of birds do that?"

But with a nine-and-a-half foot wingspan, they would touch wires and transformers,

and electrocute themselves.

So we used a technique,

working with a local utility company to receive power poles.

These mock power poles, we would then wire to deliver a mild electric charge.

Condors are a very bright species, very inquisitive.

Bright enough to know that if it landed on one of those power poles

and received a shock once or twice, they would stop that behavior.

That behavior modification directly translated to what happened in the field.

When we released condors back into the wild,

they stopped roosting on some of those areas that had been hazardous to them.

Now, they still flew into some power lines,

and the reason for that is when you evolve like a condor,

and you make your living by riding thermals,

you don't need to look ahead when you're a thousand feet in the air.

And when you came up to a ridgeline riding a thermal

and there was a power line, it would create these collisions.

But the utility companies, once they realized that,

started to bury their power lines in those key areas.

Now, in a program like this that's been going on for thirty years,

some of these factors you can anticipate,

some you can't.

No one could've predicted

that West Nile virus would arrive in the United States in 1999,

and quickly sweep across the country,

taking with it human life, as well as a lot of avian species.

And the condors were not immune. We lost condors to West Nile virus.

But the Center for Disease Control developed a vaccine that we used

that required us to vaccinate every condor in the population.

Easy to say, but more difficult to do

when you've got birds in the wild as well as in the breeding centers.

And once they're vaccinated, then they have to receive a booster every year.

Rather monumental thing that we have to do but to safeguard the population.

Now, one of the things that we also learned

is the environment that we're putting condors back into was fairly dirty.

And we underestimated that.

This is what we call microtrash.

It's items that people leave behind when they're out enjoying nature.

It's bottle caps and pieces of glass and plastic and electrical devices.

And you can see by this radiograph that microtrash in the body of a condor.

It requires surgery to remove it.

For the parents, they ingest this microtrash.

We're not completely certain why, but the theory is that condors,

during certain times, take in small pieces of bone for calcium,

particularly when females are getting ready to lay an egg.

That behavior seems to have drifted to picking up these small pieces

of what they believe are bone, and it's actually microtrash.

Now, condors serve an important ecological niche.

They're a scavenging species.

Why that's important is because they clean up the environment

when an animal dies.

They go down and feed on those carcasses.

Growing in those carcasses are toxins like botulism and anthrax.

Those are harmful to us; they're certainly harmful to other species of wildlife.

And condors are immune to these types of toxins, and so they clean it up.

But in that behavior, they're indiscriminate feeders

when they're feeding on a carcass.

They're ingesting tissue and organ, and small pieces of bone.

And sometimes they ingest lead - lead from sport hunting.

Now, I have to tell you that hunters have been on this planet

since the dawn of man.

And the hunting community generates 8 billion dollars a year for conservation.

And it's important that programs like that are sustainable.

But as condors ingest this lead, it's toxic to them,

as it is to other life forms.

This is a radiograph of a piece of lead that was taken out of a condor.

Now, some of our greatest conservationists, I have to say,

people like John James Audubon, President Theodore Roosevelt, were avid hunters,

but they were more passionate conservationists.

So it isn't a issue of sport hunting; it's an issue of toxin in an environment.

And one of the ways that it is is through lead.

We've had lead in other products. We've had lead in paint.

And we found out that children mouthing on their toys,

chewing on their cribs,

were ingesting lead through paint.

And it was removed from that product. It was removed from gasoline.

Lead was even removed from shotgun shells and replaced with steel

because it was causing problems with waterfowl.

So we have the ability to make adjustments in programs like this

as it affects wildlife and humans.

Now, in a program like this, we also have to anticipate

what the next challenge might be.

And I have to say that with wind turbines coming into United States,

it is a good green initiative to reduce our consumption of fossil fuels.

And wind energy is one of those alternatives.

And to date, there's never been a condor taken by a turbine.

But turbines have affected other raptors like eagles and hawks.

And so we're working with utility companies,

these wind energy companies,

to develop techniques to reduce the threat.

One way to do that is looking at condors and how they utilize their habitat

through spatial ecology.

That's not just looking at how condors fly north, south, east and west,

but how they fly in that third dimension, in elevation,

and working with companies to see if they're willing to adjust the field,

based on a condor's activity

and understanding why condors use the habitat that they use.

That's part of the research that's going on.

Another way that we're working with utility companies

is early detection systems.

Condors outfitted with devices that would send a signal

as they proceeded towards a turbine field -

one that's existing or one that's in planning.

What that would allow those energy companies to do

is turn down or turn off those turbines as those condors were flying through.

In a program like this, it is imperative to have collaboration

from so many different people and organizations.

No one entity can do it by themselves,

but collectively it's, as we've seen, possible.

So where are we today?

We started with 22 condors left in the world.

Now we have more than 400,

more than half of those flying free

in the skies of California, Arizona and Baja, Mexico.

The program has gone full cycle.

Whereas you can see, there's an egg in the wild that's about to hatch.

That dark spot on that egg is a "pip" site.

That is a chick about to emerge.

And the picture on the bottom right shows a chick that hatched in the wild.

Birds that were raised in zoos and breeding centers and released

are now carrying out the life cycle themselves in the wild.

So people ask me all the time, "Why?"

And we've heard this today,

"Why spend so much resource and so much energy to save a species?"

If you look at these species like condors and pandas and elephant and tiger,

we share the same environments around this planet as they do.

We live in the same places.

If you look at them as environmental indicators, they're telling us

how healthy the environment is that we share with them.

What we've got to do is listen to what they're saying

We have the ability to affect change.

We've seen that.

We've had the ability to affect change around the world.

We just have to make sure that we continue those efforts

because it is all possible.

Thank you.

(Applause)