Zoo Has Big Plans for Little Moko : Condors: Newest chick will be released into wild next winter if all goes well. It is fifth to hatch in breeding program since last year.

After three days of raspy squeaking and squirming, “Moko,” a condor chick, finally emerged from its pale aqua-colored eggshell Sunday morning at the Los Angeles Zoo.

Moko’s name is rooted in the Northern California language of the Miwok and Costanoan Native Americans. It means “to be born and leave”--an apt designation, since it may be among those condors released into the wild later this year if the breeding program continues to be successful.

The 6 1/2-ounce, sparsely feathered chick is the fifth condor to hatch at the zoo since a special incubation program was begun last year.

Moko’s sex will not be known for three months, when it will be determined by chromosome analysis.

In all, 41 California condors are in captivity at the zoo and the San Diego Wild Animal Park.

Six Andean condor females, native to the west coast of South America, are currently flying free in the condors’ native habitat, Los Padres National Forest, under a program monitored by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service field biologists.

Moko, whose egg was produced Jan. 19, is the third offspring of its parents, Kaweah, its mother, and Anyapa. The first two chicks hatched last year.

Zoo bird curator Dr. Mike Wallace said the parents “continue to behave affectionately toward one another” and could produce more offspring.

At maturity, Moko could be released into the Los Padres National Forest. At that time, possibly next December or January, two other young California condors would join Moko, Wallace said.

The plan, he said, is to have the Andean condors teach their California relatives “how to live in the wild.” It is hoped that after seven years, the condors will start reproducing.