Los
Angeles Zoo has come up with a unique way of expanding the population of the
rare California condor.
Staff
have been working on saving the condor for 30 years, and have now mastered how
to fertilise its eggs.
The
scavenging birds became so rare in the wild that the last 27 of the species
were captured in 1987 and brought into captivity to try and save them from
extinction.
The condors,
which have a wingspan of up to 9 feet (274 cm), were reintroduced into the wild
in the early 1990s but still the numbers didn't grow at an exponential rate.
This is
because the condor in the wild only gives birth to one fertile egg a year and
that offspring is looked after by two parents.
This
year, the zoo has incubated 6 eggs and placed them with three sets of condor
parents with great success.
The
California condor's numbers in the wild dwindled after human settlement in
California, because of poaching, lead poisoning from shot animals they feed on
and egg collectors at the beginning of the 20th century. The species is the
only surviving bird in the Gymnogyps genus and can live up to 40 years old.
With egg
collecting a thing of the past and new laws brought in banning lead in hunter
ammunition, the species now has a chance to survive in the wild.
There are
now around 500 California condors left in the world.
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