One of the most interesting shows to hit screens on the Central and South Coasts this summer isn’t featuring a major Hollywood star, or a superhero.
You might call it the ultimate reality show, because it’s a live webcam showing nature in action. For the third year in a row, a coalition of groups involved in condor research has a “condor-cam” on line. You can watch the adventures of two adult condors, and their chick in a nest in a remote area of the Los Padres National Forest, a spot called Devil’s Gate in the mountains north of Fillmore.
See the condor-cam live:
Joseph Brandt is a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service who’s involved in efforts to preserve, and study the endangered birds.
He says considering there were less than two dozen of the birds left in the wild in the 1980’s, their comeback into the hundreds is amazing, and a testament to recovery efforts.
Condors are incredible looking birds to see in person. They weight between 15 and 3o pounds, and have a wingspan of eight to nine feet, the largest of any bird in North America. They are black in color, with white markings under their wings, and ivory beaks. The birds are scavengers, and will eat the leftovers of anything from deer to sea lions killed by other animals.
The condor cam is part of an effort to make people aware of the condors, which have a rich heritage in the backcountry of the Central and South Coasts. The camera is a joint educational effort of the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and the Santa Barbara Zoo.
The biggest issue condors face is lead they accidently ingest. Because they are scavengers, they will sometimes eat carcasses of animals killed by hunters, and will ingest bullets. Lead poisoning is one of the biggest problems facing recovery efforts, and efforts are underway to limit the use of lead bullets. The other manmade problem condors face is from what is microtrash. It is small items the adult birds collect for their young thinking it’s a food source, but is actually items like bottle caps which can block the digestive systems of young chicks, and lead to their starvation.
The condor cam’s audience has become impressive in size. Last year, when the webcam livestreamed a condor chick hatching, it was watched by nearly a million people in 150 countries, and that doesn’t include the people who saw highlights in TV newscasts. And, if the online coverage really piques your interest, you can actually see some of the birds in person, at the Santa Barbara Zoo, which is home to some of the birds.
