Condor 828 in late spring, 60 days old | Photo: National Park Service
The staff at Pinnacles National Park made a happy announcement on Friday; a five-and-a-half-month-old California condor chick successfully flew out of its nest in the park last week. That's the first time a baby condor has fledged at Pinnacles since the 19th Century.
The baby condor, dubbed Condor 828, hatched in April of this year from an egg laid in February. Baby condors typically remain in their nests for their first six months, which means Condor 828 is developing ahead of schedule. According to the National Park Service, Condor 828's precocious first flight from her nest last week was observed closely by her doting mother, Condor 236 - released by condor captive breeding program biologists at Big Sur - and dad Condor 340, released at Pinnacles.
Since then, says Pinnacles condor program manager Rachel Wolstenholme, little 828 has been getting to know her nest's immediate surroundings.
--
--
She's doing great, Wolstenholme told KCET. She's doing exactly what she's supposed to be doing after fledging: making flights from tree to tree, spending a lot of time just hanging out in the treetops.
related
Repeal of Californias Lead Ammo Ban Fails -- For Now
Condors Throw Dead Sea Lion Party at Big Sur
Report: Fracking Imperils Southern California Residents, Wildlife
1 of 7
next
Condor 828 is the first successfully fledged condor chick Pinnacles has seen since the 1890s. Condors have nested in the park in recent years, and even laid eggs that hatched out, but modern life is tough on baby condors. We've had eggs that didn't hatch, said Wolstenholme, and a few chicks that hatched but didn't make it to the fledging stag. Chicks are very vulnerable to predators.
The young condor's flight from the nest gives us a strong sense of hope, said Karen Beppler-Dorn, superintendent of Pinnacles National Park. However, our hope is tempered by the challenges that still exist for her and all wild condors.
California condors have the longest wingspan of any bird native to North America, with some individuals reaching just under ten feet from wingtip to wingtip. Only the trumpeter swan edges out the condor from being North Americas heaviest bird: 25-pound condors are not particularly uncommon. With a lifespan of up to 60 years, condors are also among the longest-lived birds in North America.
Sadly, wild condors rarely live out their full allotted 60 years these days, as they contend with the hazards of the modern world. Condors are doing better these days than they were a generation ago, but thats due to the prodigious and expensive efforts of wildlife biologists. In 1987, the total world population of California condors had fallen to 27, all of which were captured that year in an attempt to preserve the species through captive breeding. For the last 15 years biologists have been reintroducing condors into the wild in California, Arizona, and Baja California. Though there have been some successful fledges like 828's, the majority of the free-flying California condor population has been hatched in captivity and released into the wild by biologists. Without the captive breeding program, the birds wouldn't be able to replenish their numbers quickly enough to maintain a stable population, much less a growing one.
That's due to a number of factors, from a scarcity of large carrion for the birds to eat to environmental hazards such as powerlines. But one of the biggest threats to condors is lead poisoning, generally coming from bullets or lead shot the condors find in scavenged game. Condors have a habit of selecting and ingesting small hard fragments found in carrion, which may have helped the birds get enough calcium back before the advent of lead ammo. But that habit often means the the birds will carefully pick out and ingest lead ammo in a carcass or hunter's gutpile. Lead poisoning may be responsible for a third or more of condor deaths in the wild.
828 with her father, Condor 340. Male condors do much of the work teaching fledged chicks how to behave once they leave the nest. | Photo: NPS
Use of lead ammunition has been banned since 2008 in condor territory in California, and a statewide ban will take effect in 2019. Condor advocates hope the ban will make it easier for condors to go about their business without ingesting the deadly heavy metal, increasing the species' chances of eventually surviving without help.
In the meantime, Condor 828's so-far successful entrance into the world is bringing wildlife biologists hope for the future of the species. Condors nesting in the wild and surviving on their own is what it's all about, said Kelly Sorenson, executive director of the Ventana Wildlife Society, which first initiated condor releases in the Big Sur-Pinnacles area of central California in 1997. This is yet another milestone towards that goal.
Banner: an adult California condor in Arizona, 2013 | Photo: Michael Arrighi, some rights reserved
Most recent headlines
11/12/2025
Dalet, a leading provider of cloud-native, end-to-end media workflow solutions, ...
02/12/2025
Case Study: How Mid-Atlantic Sports Network Moved to All-IP Distribution in 60 D...
02/12/2025
2025 Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame: Lee Corso, Coach, Commentator, FirebrandBy Ken Kerschbaumer
Tuesday, December 2, 2025 - 7:00 am
Print This Story | S...
02/12/2025
SVG All-Stars: Dan Nabors, Senior Director, Remote Engineering, TNT SportsThe veteran tech leader is helping guide Warner Bros. Discovery's at-home' re...
02/12/2025
National Lacrosse League Opens Season With New Cloud-Based Official Replay-Revie...
02/12/2025
Platinum White Paper: The Cinematic Look in Live Production - Bridging Aesthetic...
02/12/2025
SVG India Announces Advisory Board; JioStar's Prashant Khanna Named ChairmanBy Ken Kerschbaumer
Tuesday, December 2, 2025 - 11:15 am
Print This Story |...
02/12/2025
SVG Summit 2025 Preview: New AI Production Tools Workshop' Features ESPN, F...
02/12/2025
Written and directed by Hailey Gates, Atropia won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival....
02/12/2025
The lightweight and highly portable CORVUS-RAVEN, recently demonstrated at the V...
02/12/2025
The lightweight, rugged Panther 2 tri-band VSAT delivers high-speed data communications for Internet, VPN connectivity and video transmission over commercial an...
02/12/2025
eds3_5_jq(document).ready(function($) { $(#eds_sliderM519).chameleonSlider_2_1({...
02/12/2025
NGID volunteers in the United States
NGID volunteers in Mexico
NGID volunteers in India
NGID volunteers in Spain
NGID volunteers in Australia
NGID voluntee...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission's Media Bureau has issued a reminder that stations in DMAs 111 through 120 must implement its audio descrip...
02/12/2025
SAN DIEGO Sony Electronics today introduced the Alpha 7 V (ILCE-7M5), the fifth generation of its Alpha 7 full-frame mirrorless lineup, powered by the newly dev...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has opened a docket for comments on Nexstar Media Group's proposed $6.2 billion acquisition of Tegna and se...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON The National Association of Broadcasters has added a trio of media executives, Veronica Rodriguez, Matt Schnaars and Jeff Warshaw, to its board of di...
02/12/2025
MILAN, Italy Brightcove has released seven new features designed to expand global reach, improve audience engagement, enhance live-streaming quality and streaml...
02/12/2025
BCNEXXT, the developers of the advanced playout platform Vipe, today announced a new Service Provider Partner agreement with NPC Media, the Australian managed p...
02/12/2025
DPA Microphones today announces the immediate availability of its new N-Series Digital Wireless Microphone System for customers throughout the U.S. In addition ...
02/12/2025
Hiltron Communications reports a well attended and successful Space Tech Expo exhibition, held at the Messe Bremen from Tuesday November 18 through Thursday Nov...
02/12/2025
The beginning of September saw Riverfire by Australian Retirement Trust, in association with Channel 9 and Triple M, kick off the 2025 Brisbane Festival in spec...
02/12/2025
SGM Lighting is pleased to announce an exciting new partnership with ACT Entertainment, under which ACT will serve as the exclusive distributor for SGM's ne...
02/12/2025
Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT) today announced that Telia, the second largest telecom operator in Norway, is modernizing its broadband network with the company's i...
02/12/2025
European cloud data protection specialist Keepit is expanding its sales network in the DACH region and has gained TIM AG, one of the leading value-added distrib...
02/12/2025
Featured products at ISE 2026
This year s ISE 2026 theme "Push Beyond" reflects Calrec s direction of travel. The company is dedicated to supporting the AV an...
02/12/2025
Czech Television, the national public broadcaster, has deployed one of the largest LiveU live production projects in the region for live sports and news coverag...
02/12/2025
Test & measurement innovator, Leader Electronics, has announced the release of v8.2 software for its ZEN and ZEN-W Series, bringing advanced cinematic camera se...
02/12/2025
Global provider of video streaming software and services, Accedo, and OTT platform provider, Magine Pro, have signed a binding agreement to carve out and merge ...
02/12/2025
With proven success in broadcast, OTT, and content supply chains, K.S Avinash set to scale Skandha's service-first approach across APAC
Skandha Media Servi...
02/12/2025
AJA Video Systems has joined the RAVENNA community, a network of partners devoted to advancing the RAVENNA standard for distributing real-time audio over intern...
02/12/2025
HUNT VALLEY, Md. Sinclair and its wholly-owned subsidiary One Media Technologies have released a new report focused on how ATSC 3.0, the IP-based NextGen TV sta...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission's Media Bureau has issued a reminder that stations in DMAs 111 through 120 must implement its audio descrip...
02/12/2025
WASHINGTON Members of the Advanced Television Systems Committee have elected four industry veterans to three-year terms on the organization's board of direc...
02/12/2025
A new survey from S&P Global Market Intelligence Kagan highlights how important social media is for younger consumers, with Gen Z spending 5.1 hours a day on so...
02/12/2025
Faculty Notes: Fall/Winter 2025 Recent accomplishments, releases, and events by Berklee faculty.
December 1, 2025
By
Editorial Staff
The cast of Kind of M...
02/12/2025
Ring In The Holidays With Our Biggest Sale Ever On Ivory II Pianos!From now until December 31st, you can save 50% or more on every Ivory II piano and collection...
02/12/2025
Back to All News
Made in America: How Stranger Things' Electrified the US Economy
Entertainment
02 December 2025
GlobalUnited States
Link copied to cl...
02/12/2025
Back to All News
Culinary Class Wars' Season 2 Trailer Teases New Rules, R...
02/12/2025
--
The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), and the International Telecommunication Unio...
02/12/2025
Harmonic's cOS Platform Will Redefine Subscribers' Quality of Experience, Lowering Churn SAN JOSE, Calif. - Dec. 2, 2025 - Harmonic (NASDAQ: HLIT) today...
02/12/2025
At AWS re:Invent, NVIDIA and Amazon Web Services expanded their strategic collab...
02/12/2025
S an Nollaig
Hollywood blockbusters The Banshees of Inisherin, Barbie and Oppenheimer make their Irish TV debut
Tune into the classics such as Love Actual...
02/12/2025
Showcasing fresh Irish storytelling and emerging talent Storyland 2025 signals a fantastic time for Irish drama
RT and F s ireann/Screen Ireland are proud to...
01/12/2025
L3Harris and PentenAmio formalise their teaming agreement at MilCIS 2025, streng...
01/12/2025
Artemis II is NASA's first crewed flight test of the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft. The crew, from left: Commander Reid Wiseman, Pilot Vic...
01/12/2025
IRVINE, Calif. Wooden Camera has introduced its new Accessory Collection for the Canon EOS C50. The new lineup includes a low-profile, gimbal-ready cage, expand...
01/12/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has released a tentative agenda for its Dec. 18 Open Commission Meeting that will include a vote on a report an...
01/12/2025
In most years, a graph of annual local TV ad spending is about as predictable as an electrocardiogram of a reasonably healthy patient in a doctor's office. ...
Condor 828 in late spring, 60 days old | Photo: National Park Service 
