A look inside the monumental effort to save the Andean condor

The enormous vulture has declined due to poisonings and land development, but rescue efforts are helping it slowly make a comeback.

Tupun Catu, a rehabilitated juvenile condor, spreads his wings to take flight above the Cordon del Plata Park in Mendoza, Argentina, in April 2022. Each time the Andean Condor Conservation Program (PCCA) returns a condor to the wild, members of local Indigenous communities come to take part in a ceremony honoring the condor. Each community’s ceremony is unique, and an essential part of the PCCA’s approach to conservation.
ByRebecca Dzombak
Photographs bySofia Lopez Mañan
August 11, 2022
11 min read

The world’s largest bird of prey is in trouble, and locals are working to save it. 

The Andean condor, a massive South American cousin of the California condor, once soared along the full length and breadth of the Andes and beyond. With a wingspan of 10 feet and a life span of 50 years, the bird has long been revered among Indigenous Andean cultures as a symbol of power and immortality. It’s the national bird of at least four countries.

The illustrious vulture, however, hasn’t been able to withstand human encroachment. Wind turbines and power lines can stop condors mid-flight. Lead bullets, buried in carcasses abandoned by hunters, slowly poison the scavengers’ blood. Some agricultural communities leave out poison bait to kill predators that prey on their livestock, a practice that also kills condors indirectly. Deliberate hunting and poaching are rare, but still happens.

Classified as vulnerable to extinction by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), only about 6,700 adult condors remain in the wild today. But scientists, conservationists, and Indigenous communities are helping the iconic bird make a comeback. 

The Andean Condor Conservation Program (PCCA) has been leading that effort in Argentina for three decades. In that time, the program has rescued at least 370 condors—more than five percent of the species’ overall population—and has hatched and released 80 condor chicks. In doing so, the group has reestablished Andean condors along the Atlantic coast of southern Patagonia.

At a condor release in the province of Tucumán in northwestern Argentina, Diaguita chief Santos Pastrana guides the ceremony with a wand featuring a traditional Andean depiction of a double-headed condor. “For our community, all biodiversity, but especially the condor, is a symbol of spirituality, wisdom, and courage,” Pastrana says.
Kurruf is one of 64 condors the program has released along Patagonia’s Atlantic coast as part of an effort to reestablish the Andean condor’s 19th century range. Local oral histories and historical references, such as Charles Darwin’s notes from his time there, have helped conservationists reconstruct that range. Now, for the first time in 170 years, the Andean condor can be seen coast to coast in Argentina.

To many, the loss of the condor—and its slow resurgence—is personal and emotional. They’re the “spirit of the Andes,” says Luis Jácome, director of the PCCA. Many Patagonian villagers, he says, recall stories their grandparents told of the enormous birds, flying over the hills. 

Because of this deep-seated connection with Andean peoples, every time the PCCA releases a condor, the local community hosts a unique ceremony, led by a spiritual leader, to celebrate the bird’s return and offer prayers. To Jácome, this is an essential part of reintroducing the condor to its home. “Our work is like the two wings of the condor,” he says. “One wing is scientific knowledge, and the other is culture. The condor is a sacred bird for all our people in South America.” 

Photographer and National Geographic Explorer Sofia Lopez Mañan is dedicated to recognizing this unique role the bird plays in Indigenous society and has spent the last six years working intimately with the PCCA “condor family.” More than anything, she says it felt like fate: “I started working with condors because they chose me.” 

In addition to hatching, rescuing, and releasing condors, scientists with PCCA are using GPS-tracking collars to follow the birds once they return to the wild. The data allows them to identify key habitats and educate policymakers about which areas should be targeted for protection. Some of the most crucial Patagonian lands where the birds have been released back into the wild are proposed for development for energy production, using wind turbines and green hydrogen.

“Today, we are living in conflict,” Jácome says. “There must be a return to the natural order.” 

Among birds, condors are exceptionally slow breeders, only reproducing when they reach maturity at around nine years old and rearing a chick every two to three years. To help speed up the process, the PCCA sometimes removes eggs from captive pairs in zoological institutions to incubate in its facility. After the egg is removed, the couple will typically produce a second that remains in their care, multiplying the reproductive capacity of the species. Tama, this rescued female condor, has laid several eggs and the PCCA has released her chicks into the wild.
Veterinarian Jennifer Ibarra examines an X-ray of a dead condor, looking for signs of lead bullets the bird ate while scavenging carrion. Pastoralists throughout Argentina still use lead bullets to shoot animals such as pumas, guanacos, deer, and wild dogs that prey on livestock. Condors that feed on the dead predators ingest the bullets, and the lead slowly poisons their blood.

In June 2021, this female condor, Suyan, was found dead after ingesting a lead bullet, just under two years after she was released into Patagonia. Lead bullets and poison bait are two of the key threats to Andean condors, says Sergio Lambertucci, head of the IUCN’s vulture specialist group. Toxic bait, he says, “kills a lot of individuals in a single event.” Conservationists and scientists are advocating for the use of lead bullets in hunting to be made illegal in Argentina.
As the Andean condor has dwindled, so too has traditional knowledge associated with the bird—paralleling the erasure and loss of Indigenous identities and languages. Wüsüwül Wirka a pana, or Daniel Huircapan, of the Kawal a külü community of the Günün a küna People, is working to preserve this history by leading release ceremonies—and along with them, the cultural importance of the condor.
The Valle Encantado (“enchanted valley”) in Los Cardones National Park is a good place to search the skies for Andean condors, which in Argentina tend to favor lower-lying valleys rather than high mountain peaks. The ACCP rescues and releases condors here, but some residents of nearby pastoral towns are skeptical of the release of condors because they fear the birds will hunt livestock, although this has not been observed.

Marcos Pastrana is a leader in the Indigenous Diaguita community in Tafí del Valle, Argentina. As an anti-mining activist and geologist, he has seen the havoc human activity wreaks on the environment and wildlife, including condors. “Man in his pride believes he is the subject of rights, of intellect, of spirituality, the subject of everything. We talk about human rights to water, but… do other species, other forms of life, have no space?”
Huasi, a male Andean condor, receives a veterinary check-up at the ACCP’s Species Recovery Center in Temaikén Bioparque in Buenos Aires. During these check-ups, veterinarians also attach a wing band with a number for identification. A day before their release, condors are outfitted with GPS telemetry equipment to track their flight paths. Huasi will be released in Sierra Pailemán, at the northern tip of Patagonia, in October.
All the chicks at the PCCA’s hatching facility, located at the Buenos Aires Eco-park,  are raised in isolation from humans to preserve their wild instincts. Here, PCCA executive director Vanesa Astore demonstrates how biologists use condor puppets, mimicking parents in the wild, to feed chicks inside a nursery to give them the best chances at survival once they are released.
Sofia Lopez Mañan
At two months old and 15 inches tall, Karut stands in a incubator at the ACCP’s hatching facility just after mealtime. Karut hatched after spending 57 days in an incubator and is one of 80 condor chicks to be reared here. To date, almost every condor released from the hatching program has survived, although some have succumbed to the same threats that face all condors—poison bait and lead bullets.
The Arita Cone, a cinder cone volcano, juts above the Arizaro Salt Flat high in the Andes, straddling the border of Argentina and Chile. In local Indigenous languages, Arizaro means “roost of the condor;” the birds were once prevalent here, feeding on carcasses of animals attempting to cross the desolate salt flats, according to local histories.
Huarpe people participate in a silent ceremony in Mendoza to mark the release of condor Tupun Catu earlier this year. Before the cage is opened, the assembled guests are each cleansed with smoldering, fragrant herbs and a condor feather. Then, all step back and the door is lifted; the condor may walk around for a while or immediately spread its wings and take flight. At that—a joyful shout goes up—jallalla! “Every time you have the experience to see condors fly over your head, it is incredible,” says Jácome.
Once chicks at the rearing facility are old enough, they are transferred to a large cage in the rocky hillsides of the Sierra Pailemán at the northern tip of the Patagonia coast. For two months prior to their release, they live here, adapting to chilly temperatures and sometimes buffeting winds—their natural habitat. On release day, the door is opened and the flock stretches their wings for the first time, flying out into their long-abandoned Atlantic habitat.
Santos Pastrana is chief of the Diaguita community in Tafí del Valle, a city in northwestern Argentina. Here, he stands at an Apacheta, a sacred stone construction built to make offerings to Pachamama, the mother-like deity revered many in the Andes. Spiritual leaders of the Indigenous communities throughout Argentina are not only involved only in the ceremonial condor releases, but are also critical team members for condor rescue, rehabilitation, and education.

By tracking the birds with GPS telemetry, scientists have learned that condors’ ranges often span hundreds of miles from where they were released, encompassing the dry, rocky slopes of the Andes, verdant seaside coasts, and everything in between. As more condors are raised, rescued and released, that range will continue to expand, and the team will know which areas are most important to protect.
The National Geographic Society, committed to illuminating and protecting the wonder of our world, funded Explorer Sofia Lopez Mañan’s work. Learn more about the Society’s support of Explorers highlighting and protecting critical species.

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