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From: dmark@acsu.buffalo.edu (David Mark)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: what KIND of condor did you say you saw....?
Message-ID: <36871@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU>
Date: 20 Sep 90 02:16:23 GMT
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The following "news" item may be of interest.  I was not aware
of this.

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           ANDEAN BIRDS TEST SKIES FOR CALIFORNIA CONDOR

The test release of Andean condors in California may pave the way for
the reintroduction of the state's native condors, now living only in
captivity and totalling 40 birds.  The success of the program proved
that zoo-raised condors can survive in the wild.
     Between 1988 and 1990, 13 South American fledglings, raised in
captivity in the U.S., were released by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service and the Los Angeles Zoo on the 1.75-million-acre Los Padres
National Forest, near Santa Barbara.  The vultures quickly learned
to soar; at maturity, their wingspan will reach 10 feet, slightly
wider than the California condor's.  The young birds found the
food set out to aid their survival, and ten of them adjusted
successfully.  They will eventually be recaptured to augment populations
in South America and to prevent crossbreeding after the California
condors are released.
     The hatching this year of eight California condors has made
biologists optimistic that these giants may return to the California
skies by 1992."

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Source:  National Geographic Magazine, "Earth Almanac" column, 
         October 1990, p. 140. 

Copyright: National Geographic Society, 1990

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A.B.A. listers:  If the California Condors are re-introduced in
1992, will we have to wait 10 years (introduced birds rule) 
before we can count them for our lists again?

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David Mark
dmark@acsu.buffalo.edu