PREY-GO-NEESH PROGRAM SOARS
The first year of California condor reintroduction has seen success
On Wednesday, satellite information showed that a group of eight reintroduced California condors had spent their first night on the Yurok Reservation near the Klamath River. While many people have reported fly-overs of the birds, known as prey-goneesh in the Yurok language, it was a first for the recently released animals to roost at Klamath overnight.
The first condors were brought back to their historic range last year in late March through the Northern California Condor Restoration Program and released soon after. The Yurok Tribe led the effort with Redwood National Park; the tribe’s wildlife department runs the condor release facility. Other condors were released later in the year in singles and pairs, with a total of eight juveniles now flying around, usually returning to the facility for food every few days (often seen on the Yurok Condor Cam at https://www. yuroktribe.org/yurok-condorlive-feed).
“This first cohort, they have the hardest job of any of the birds that are gonna come after, here, because they don’t have an existing flock to integrate with,” said Tiana Williams-Claussen, Yurok Wildlife Department director.
This was the most nervewracking part for her, she said, as the birds who’d never really flown outside before had to move into a brand new landscape with no teachers showing them the ropes.
The juvenile condor Poy’we-son, or A3, for example, had a three-week stint away from the program’s facility that feeds the birds every few days with carcasses of donated dairy calves and goats, sometimes roadkill. His name means “the one who goes out ahead” because he is the leader; the first bird out the door.
He got stuck in a group of trees “which is understandable because like I said, he’s never flown before. This is a brand new place,” she said.
Eventually, he was able to get out by watching the flight patterns of turkey vultures and copying their spiral upwards. She said even mature condors will hang out in flocks of turkey vultures, who have a much better sense of smell and can lead them to their preferred food, carcasses.
“I always pictured a group of roving teenagers traveling around town and figuring out the best places to hang out,” she said.
The juveniles don’t have their parents here, who would traditionally teach them all the best hang-out spots in Northern California for the first two years of their lives, so they’re figuring things out from other teachers. Every time one of the birds learns something new, they teach it to their flockmates, as they are highly social.
The Yurok Tribe formally started the effort in 2008 to reintroduce the California condor, with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the National Park Service. WilliamsClaussen said that the condor is really meaningful to a number of North Coast tribes.
For the Yurok, “he’s very tied to what I consider to be our foundational reason for being, which is world renewal, or fix the earth people,” she said. This is linked to the condor’s livelihood of cleaning up the landscape and making it new again by eating dead creatures. She also said the condor has spiritual contributions through the use of feathers in regalia and stories and songs.
“My own family taught me that you’d never harm a condor because it is so sacred
and any feathers that it receives are considered to be gifts from the birds that they drop,” she said.
For Williams-Claussen, having this next generation of kids be able to grow up in a relationship with condors in a way that she could not is very meaningful. For her, seeing the condors stay at Klamath overnight was special, both as a tribal member and resident of Klamath.
This first cohort of condors will teach the others that will be released in the upcoming years. More condors will come every fall for the next 20 years, in cohorts of four to six. All, so far, have come from the Oregon Zoo or the World Center for Birds of Prey in Boise, Idaho. The breeding facilities are helping in repopulating California condors in their native range.
Williams-Claussen said Chris West, a senior wildlife biologist, has hashed out with her out all the contingencies of what might happen.
“The reality of the situation is we’re gonna lose birds at some point,” she said, as a matter of nature. The program does treat any diseases of the birds — one, He-we-chek, is even named for health “I am healthy or well” because she is the first bird to receive medical treatment for swelling.
California condors disappeared from the area due to a combination of human impacts during the late 1800s, in the time of the gold rush that meant an influx of more people. Condors like big cavities in tall redwoods, which were decimated from logging. A decrease in food coincided with the logging.
“We used to maintain these very expansive prairies with the use of traditional fire, at least in Yurok Country. Prairies are only 1% of what they used to be, which is partially why Redwood National Parks are so important because they maintain these big beautiful prairies,” plus the redwoods, she said.
Humans overharvested elk, deer and sea lions, all food sources for the condors. Conservation efforts have brought these populations back.
Human impacts still are causing deaths. WilliamsClaussen noted half of all condor deaths where a cause can be identified was from a lead bullet. Lead bullets are soft enough to break into pieces and get absorbed into condors. Williams-Claussen said outreach to hunters has really helped, saying that she switched to copper bullets after learning of the danger. Other threats include avian flu, an outbreak of which killed a number of condors in the southwest. The facility has added a quarantine facility to protect against this, but so far no antibodies or infections have been found.
The birds historically scavenged half of the food from the marine environment and half inland. So far, the reintroduced birds have definitely been making it to the ocean, and have been spotted over coastal lagoons.
But the next step for the teenagers is to take on some wild foraging.
“If you make things too comfortable for them, they’re gonna be leisurely about it. So they have not yet started foraging naturally, but we expect it’ll just be a matter of time,” said WilliamsClaussen.
At the end of 2022, there was a total world population of 561 California condors according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. Of those, 347 are free-flying, and 183 are in California. WilliamsClaussen said she was grateful for the community support the program has seen. Since their release, the condors have traveled as far south as Kneeland and as far north as the Klamath River, near Weitchpec, according to a Yurok Tribe Instagram post.
The names of the condors are below:
A0 (female) — Ney-gem ‘Ne-Chween-kah “She carries our prayers.”
A1 (male) — Hlow Hoolet — Finally, we fly.
A2 (male) — Nes-kwechokw’ = I return/arrive
A3 (male) — Poy’-we-son = The one who goes out ahead (the leader, first bird out the door).
A4 (male) — Cher-perhl So-nee-ne-pek’ = I feel strong
A5 (male) — Neeen’ = Watcher
A6 (male) — Me-newkwek’ = I’m bashful or shy
A7 (female) — He-wechek = I am healthy or well (first bird to receive medical treatment, had a swelling near her bill that was infringing on her, but she’s tough and powered through until we could get her treatment).