Tragedy struck the Yurok tribe’s condor restoration efforts when one of the critically endangered birds succumbed to lead poisoning — an entirely preventable, human-caused threat — just months after being released from the Los Angeles Zoo into the wild.
The bird, Pey-noh-pey-o-wok, had been flying freely for only three months when he died in the backcountry of Redwood National Park after ingesting a lead air-gun pellet, the tribe announced Wednesday. At 18 months old, he was the youngest bird in his flock of 18.
“A natural death would have been less painful for us, the humans watching, as he started to flourish in the wild,” Tiana Williams-Claussen, the tribe’s wildlife department director, said in a statement. “That he was brought down by something human-caused and preventable is devastating.”
Pey-noh-pey-o-wok, the tribe says, means “I am friend or kind or good-natured.” True to his name, the young condor was always willing to share his food and often spotted grooming and huddling together with other birds in his flock, Williams-Claussen said in the statement.
A pathology examination found an air-gun pellet in his gizzard and high concentrations of lead in his liver and bone. Lead poisoning is the single biggest threat to condors and responsible for around half of all moralities.
In November, another member of the flock spent 22 days receiving treatment for extremely elevated lead levels at the Sequoia Park Zoo’s Condor Care Facility before being re-released into the wild.
At the time, Yurok tribe biologist Chris West said it “almost seems inevitable that we will lose a bird or birds to lead poisoning if nothing changes.”
This month, his prediction proved true.
“The loss of Pey-noh-pey-o-wok was a huge blow to us. Death is part of work with wild animals, but his was hard as our first loss,” West said. “Thankfully, we have 17 other amazing birds in our flock carrying our hopes, dreams and prayers.”
Condors are scavengers and play a crucial role in the ecosystem by feeding on dead animals, preventing rotting carcasses from accumulating and helping stop the spread of disease. Unfortunately, this puts them at an elevated risk of lead poisoning should they scavenge on an animal killed with lead ammunition.
Condors have a massive wingspan of up to 10 feet and, left undisturbed, can live as long as 70 years. Unfortunately, lead poisoning, habitat loss, poaching and pesticide exposure have driven the majestic birds to the brink of extinction.
Their population reached an all-time low of just 23 birds in 1987 but has rebounded to around 500 thanks to dedicated conservation efforts, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The Yurok tribe’s Northern California Condor Restoration Program plays a key role in these efforts by reintroducing condors to the tribe’s ancestral homelands.
The tribe considers the condors to be sacred and use its feathers, as well as songs about the birds, in many of their ceremonies. They plan to release another cohort of condors later this year.
