Deaths of 18 birds in Grand Canyon area have biologists in California worried about a wider spread.
A new and growing threat is facing America’s largest bird, the California condor, a famed species that has been slowly recovering from the brink of extinction.
In California, the disease has also killed bald eagles and golden eagles, turkey vultures, ducks, geese, ravens, gulls, sanderlings, grebes and other birds and has shown up in most Bay Area counties. So far, no condors have been found infected in the Golden State. Avian influenza had not been known to kill condors until the first bird in the Grand Canyon died on March 20.
Condors once ranged from British Columbia to Mexico. But because of habitat loss, hunting and lead poisoning, the majestic birds reached a low of just 22 nationwide by the early 1980s. As of Wednesday, 18 condors from the Grand Canyon area have died, with 6 confirmed from the disease and the other 12 suspected to have died from it. Another five are in veterinary care and undergoing testing for the disease, which veterinarians and biologists call “HPAI.”
“It’s scary,” said Ashleigh Blackford, California condor coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “This is a program where people have invested a lot of time in this recovery effort. This is a monumental blow in a short amount of time. You can go backward so quickly.”
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