Condor Film Offers Soaring View of an Endangered Bird

At a critical point in the California condor’s fight for survival, the San Diego Zoo led a pep rally of sorts for the majestic bird Tuesday night, with the cheers generated by a remarkable new movie by film maker Wolfgang Obst.

Obst’s magnificent panoramas of the imposing bird soaring across its mountainous Central California habitat--the first time the condor has been filmed in such detail--brought an emotional high to the crowd of special society members invited to the movie’s premiere.

The audience gasped in awe as the cameras caught the condors soaring above the chocolate-colored mountain ranges of Ventura and Kern counties, as Obst recorded for the first time the dance of a breeding pair, and the excruciating effort by scientists to retrieve a condor egg from a cliffside nest buffeted by wind and snow.

“This film tells us squarely and honestly about the issue of saving the condor,” said Betty Jo Williams, president of the San Diego Zoological Society.

Doug Myers, zoo executive director, called the film “a real high” among the highs and lows that condor researchers have experienced during the last six years in their effort to preserve the dwindling species.

“It is an emotional issue,” Myers told his large audience, almost all of whom were seeing footage of the condor for the first time despite their keen interest in animal conservation. “You can’t believe it that what you’re seeing in this movie is happening in our own backyard.

“We’re not looking at saving an African or Asian species here. This is right here in Southern California.”

Through the movie, the groups involved with saving the condor--North America’s largest bird and a species that has existed for millions of years--hope to spur greater nationwide attention and additional funds for their ongoing effort. Funded by the San Diego and Los Angeles zoos and the National Audubon Society, the movie will be shown nationwide four times, beginning Saturday, on cable TV station WTBS. The Public Broadcasting System plans to air the one-hour documentary in July.

“We hope that everyone will feel the emotion of the condor story (after viewing the film) and that it will spur more people to (support the effort),” said Art Risser, general curator of birds at the zoological society.

Only 26 of North America’s largest bird species are known to exist today: 10 at the San Diego Wild Animal Park, 11 at the Los Angeles Zoo and five in the wilderness less than an hour’s drive from the Los Angeles metropolitan area.

The number in the wild has dwindled precipitously in the last few years due to illegal shooting and related problems caused by human intrusion into legally protected habitats. In the last year, the two zoos and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have called for the capture of the remaining five condors and their placement in captivity until a sufficient number of them can be bred and released back to a safer natural refuge.

The Audubon Society has objected to the plan, and has obtained a temporary injunction in U.S. District Court prohibiting the capture of the remaining birds. The society argues that the habitat might not be protected if no birds are left in the wild, and that California condors have not been bred successfully in captivity.

Audubon Society officials chose not to attend the movie’s premiere Tuesday despite its participation in the film’s production. And while zoo officials tried to be diplomatic about the absence, their frustration at not being able to take in the five remaining birds was evident in comments.

An Audubon biologist said in the film that the capture of all outstanding condors should wait until preservation “is at the wire.”

Myers responded Tuesday to the audience: “Folks, we’re at the wire now and it’s time to do something. I am taking this personally tonight.”

The film, although it tries to walk a fine line between opposing views on how best to continue the preservation program, unintentionally provided a point for the zoos’ position. Much of the film’s focus is on the soaring and mating activity of a female known as AC-3, considered one of the healthiest birds in the condor refuge.

AC-3 died last month at the Wild Animal Park of lead poisoning. She had been observed as listless in the condor refuge and was captured as an emergency measure. Her death eliminated the last known breeding pair in the wild.

Of the condors already captured or hatched at the Wild Animal Park from eggs taken from the wild, two possible breeding pairs may be developing. But there is no certainty at present.

“At this point, the only way we believe we can save the remaining five is to bring them in,” Risser said. “But while a court in Washington, D.C., tried to decide what to do, 3,000 miles away we’ve got these five at high risk.”

In his movie, Obst presented the condor in as natural a state as possible. His success was the result of months of backbreaking hikes into remote mountain areas in both bitter cold and searing heat. Obst, a professional wildlife film maker for more than 20 years, was aided by his wife, Sharon, and cameraman Franz Camenzind.

“The film proved to be far and away the most physically and psychologically grueling film we’ve ever undertaken,” Obst said. The sequence that features the mating dance took 40 days of waiting on location, he said.

But Obst professes great pleasure at the results despite the numerous hardships of the filming.

“The condor is a symbol of our delicate relationship to nature, of our power to either destroy or create an environment in which endangered species can not only survive but thrive,” Obst said.