The birth of the 1000th chick as part of an extensive breeding and reintroduction program gives hope to many other species in peril.

The California condor is North America’s largest flying bird. It also one of the ugliest birds in the world. Sorry, in the universe. The bird would, in fact, be right at home in the cantina on Mos Eisley.  But the bird’s ungainly size and ugliness are what make it special, special enough to save.

We live in the Anthropocene, the time of man. There are few species on the planet that have eluded our impact. The condor has fared poorly, though not as poorly as some. Just 37 years ago there were 22 California condors left. They were functionally extinct in the wild: all those remaining birds had been captured and put into an ambitious breeding program to try and revive the species.

Now, nearly four decades later, a consortium of government agencies and nonprofit groups announced a rather astonishing milestone: the birth of the 1,000th California condor chick since the rescue program began. The condor’s plight is far from over. The species remains critically endangered. They live mainly in California, Arizona, southern Utah and Baja California, Mexico. The ultimate goal of the condor recovery program is a self-sustaining population, meaning the birds mate and multiply on their own in the wild.

“The radical reduction of the world’s biodiversity is something for which future generations will least forgive us.”

E.O. Wilson

Condors have died over the years, mostly due to lead poisoning, scientists discovered. The birds are scavengers and dine on carrion, oftentimes animals that have been killed by shotguns with lead shot. That realization led to California’s ban on lead ammunition, which took effect on July 1, and mandates non-lead ammunition in the taking of any wildlife in California. Many hunters objected to the ban because non-lead ammo is more expensive, but it’s better to have less lead in the environment as a whole.

In many ways, California has taken the lead in endangered species protection. One of the most successful breeding and reintroduction programs in history is taking place right off the California coast, in the Channel Islands, where the Island Fox has made an impressive recovery due to extensive (and expensive) efforts to relocate golden eagles, which predated on foxes. That said, other species in the state, like the Delta Smelt, remain in peril.

It’s hard to place a value on saving a species like the California Condor. With a nearly 10-foot wingspan, they are clearly impressive birds. Their ugliness (although, I suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder) is perhaps one of their most endearing qualities. It’s comforting to know that the bird will be around a lot longer (fingers crossed), rather than meet the fate of so many other avian species like the Dodo or the Passenger Pigeon that we know only as bones and feathers in a museum.

As the great Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson once put it: “The radical reduction of the world’s biodiversity is something for which future generations will least forgive us.”