Effort to Save Wild Breeding Condor Fails
A rare California condor, believed to have been the last breeding female condor in the wild, died of starvation Saturday in San Diego.
Officials at the San Diego Wild Animal Park, where the condor was brought Jan. 3 after being captured northeast of Los Angeles, said the bird could not eat because its digestive tract had been paralyzed from lead poisoning suffered as a result of swallowing shotgun pellets in the carcasses of animals it ate.
A tube was surgically implanted Saturday morning from the bird’s neck to its stomach in a desperate effort to feed it, park spokesman Tom Hansom said. The bird, called AC3, had been receiving intravenous food for the last six days without much success.
Only 27 California condors are still known to exist. Of those, five are in the wild and the rest are in the San Diego park or the Los Angeles Zoo.
Start your day right
Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
