Free days of the condor
Wednesday, October 28, 1998

by BLANCA A. NIEVES
Staff Writer

The first Andean condor ever hatched in captivity in New Jersey started a journey to freedom on Tuesday to its natural habitat deep in the mountains of Colombia.

The 16-month-old female chick, which was born at the Bergen County Zoological Park in Paramus, was transported to Newark International Airport for a flight to Miami.

From there,the large brown-and-gray bird -- which is almost fully grown at 3feet tall with a wingspan of about 10 feet -- was to be placed aboard another flight to Bogota, Colombia, en route to its final destination in the Andes Mountains.

The zoo is parting with one of its most treasured animals as part of an international conservation effort to build the dwindling population of this endangered species, said zoo director Tim Gunther. As of June 1998, only 172 Andean condors existed in captivity, and about 5,000 were living in the wild.

"It's a bittersweet moment, but she goes to a far better place," said Gunther, adding that handlers don't name the animals because they are not considered pets. "For years, zoos have taken animals out of the wild and placed them in zoos. Now we're returning them back to their habitats."

The condor's parents, both captive-hatched birds that were acquired from the Patuxent Wildlife Center in Maryland in 1990, will remain at the Paramus zoo.

The chick, born in June 1997, is the pair's first offspring. Its birth was considered a rare event because there are so few condors in captivity.

The chick was removed from the parents' pen about six months ago; condors usually go off on their own after about a year, Gunther said.

"This is a very proud moment for us," said Bergen County Executive William "Pat" Schuber, one of several officials who gathered to bid the bird farewell. "This condor will end up back in the wild by the spring of 1999."

At 11 a.m., zoo supervisor James Komsa took a large white net and entered the condor's pen. The chick -- which grew increasingly agitated -- was subdued by Komsa and two other handlers, who guided her into a fiberglass transport carrier.

"I'm sad to see her go, but she'll be much better off," said Cindy Norton, an animal health technician at the zoo.

Three other Andean condors -- from a bird sanctuary in Idaho and a zoo in Colorado -- will join the Bergen chick in Miami. They will be transported to Bogota, then to an enclosed compound on a remote ridge in the Los Nevados national park. They are scheduled to be released in the spring of 1999.

The Colombian environmental ministry and a conservation group called Renaser (meaning rebirth in Spanish) will start the long process of acclimating the Andean condors -- which are Colombia's national bird -- to their natural habitat.

The world's largest birds of prey, Andean condors live in Venezuela, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Argentina, and Chile. They eat the decaying remains of animals left behind by predators.

Since the captive-bred birds are accustomed to being fed by humans, one of the most important survival skills they will learn is to hunt and find food for themselves, said Alan Leiberman, a biologist at the Peregrine Fund in Boise, Idaho, which seeks to boost the population of endangered birds. They will also have to get used to living in the high altitude and colder climate of the Andes Mountains.

"Initially, the carcasses of dead animals, like rabbits, will be placed within the compound and gradually spread out in the national park, so that they can find their own food. The process usually takes about a year," he said.

"They will also learn to socialize with other condors, form cohorts with older flocks, and improve their flying skills," he said.

The condors will also be outfitted with radio transmitters, which will enable the Colombian bird handlers to provide updates to the staff at the Bergen zoo.

In the last decade, 46 Andean condors have been released in the Andes Mountains and only a few have died, Leiberman said. There have been cases where the birds have not made successful transitions and had to be retrained.

"For the most part, the program has been extremely successful. We have even confirmed that three chicks have hatched from our captive-bred birds that were released, which is very good news," Leiberman said.

Copyright © 1998 Bergen Record Corp.

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