El Niño helps baby condors hatch early

Baby condor

March 8, 1998
Web posted at: 3:49 p.m. EST (2049 GMT)

SAN DIEGO (AP) -- El Niño has been blamed for a lot of bad things, but now there's something good attached to the weather phenomenon.

The unusually heavy rains in southern California have caused an earlier than normal nesting instinct in many birds, including the California condor.

At the San Diego Wild Animal Park, the season's first condor egg hatched last week. That's about two weeks early, a trend biologists link to the heavy rainfall. The heavy rains lead to lake and pond overflows and an abundance of food for the endangered species.

See the newly hatched baby condor
	2.1MB / 39 sec. / 240x180 1.4MB / 39 sec. / 160x120 QuickTime movie

The newest chick is the 60th baby bird hatched since the Condor Recovery Program was implemented in 1982. The chick's mother was the first California condor to be conceived and hatched in captivity.

If all goes well, the new chick will be released into one of three wildlife reserves later this year.

Copyright 1998   The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Related sites:

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• The San Diego Wild Animal Park
  • Condorminium
  • California Condor Conservation Efforts

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