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With the success of captive breeding programs, the big scavengers are being released to soar again. Pinnacles National Park is said to have 19 condors so far. We went looking for them.
Condors are back! Among the world’s largest flying birds, they were almost wiped out in the 20th century, poisoned by pesticides and lead shot. With the success of captive breeding programs, notably at the Oregon Zoo, the big scavengers are being released to soar again.
Janell and I recently went looking for condors — a search that took us to Pinnacles National Park in central California. We took a 3.5-mile loop hike there along a canyon of huge orange cliffs, where you really expect to see circling scavengers. We discovered that the loop returns through a cave tunnel, where condors are scarce.
Pinnacles is said to have 19 condors so far. Condors have also been reintroduced at the Vermillion Cliffs in Arizona, but that was too far to drive. The Yurok Tribe is planning to release a few at the mouth of the Klamath River, but those birds aren’t visitable yet. When they do fly free from the Klamath, their range will include the entire state of Oregon.
These are really big birds, with 9-foot wingspans. They think nothing of cruising 100 miles to find a seal carcass on the beach. Unlike raptors, condors are unable to kill even a mouse. They like their meat ripe. Condors are the only scavenger powerful enough to rip through the tough hide of a dead seal, allowing turkey vultures and other scavengers to join the feast.
Considering that Pinnacles National Park is in the middle of California, just an hour’s drive from Santa Cruz off Highway 101, it’s surprisingly overlooked. We visited in early March, when the wildflowers are blooming and didn’t see more than a dozen other cars. Rangers told us the park is busiest later in the season. Rock climbers from the Bay Area drive down to scale the cliffs.
The backbone of the park is a ragged ridge of 23-million-year-old volcanoes, eroded down to orange spires. Oddly, the other half of this volcanic mountain chain is 200 miles south at Morro Bay, where one of the plugs juts out of the ocean. The San Andreas Fault, which probably allowed the leaking lava up in the first place, has since jolted the eastern half of the range north at the rate of 4 feet per century.
Roads do not cross the mountain range, so you first have to decide whether you want to start at the park’s west entrance near Highway 101 or the east entrance, closer to Interstate 5. The two areas are separated from each other by a 60-mile road detour — or a 6-mile hiking trail. We started at the west entrance for the easy loop hike to Balconies Cave. If you were spending a few days, you’d want to start at the east entrance, where there’s a campground.
Even on the drive to the trailhead you’ll see big black birds soaring overhead. These birds are almost certainly turkey vultures. They are also scavengers, but their wingspan is half as broad as a condor’s. If one of the vultures looks familiar, you may in fact have seen the identical bird in Oregon. During the heat of California’s summer, they migrate north, leaving the condors behind.
At the Chaparral Trailhead I asked a park ranger how to tell the difference between the two species. They look a lot alike from a distance.
“Condors don’t flap,” he explained. “And they’re usually a lot higher. They glide at altitude, looking for large dead things.”
We set off hiking up the Balconies Cliffs Trail, looking lively so as not to attract too many scavengers. The path follows a small creek along an arid canyon with contorted gray pines. Purple shooting stars bloomed on slopes, but we were mostly looking up, scanning the skies with binoculars. Vultures, we decided. No condors yet.
After 2 miles traversing cliff ledges, the path switchbacked down to a lower portion of the same creek. To complete the loop you have to follow the creek back up through a cave. Flashlights are required. Cell phones suffice, if they’re well charged.
The caves in this park are not the lava tubes of central Oregon nor the limestone caverns of Oregon Caves. They are talus caves, formed when gigantic boulders from the cliffs above have clogged the bottom of the canyon so thoroughly that you — and the creek — have to crawl underneath in the dark.
Boots are essential, because you’ll be stumbling up through a midnight stream. Expect to use your hands to clamber around boulders in the dark. Then you crouch through a long slot, following a crack between the old volcano’s layers. It’s easy to bump your head.
We emerged, rubbing our heads, into the daylight of the upper canyon. All the way back to the car we watched circling birds, by now convinced they were all vultures.
At the trailhead, discouraged, we asked a couple of English birdwatchers with much bigger binoculars if they had seen condors.
“Oh, rather,” the man said. “They’re not on the Balconies loop, of course.”
Of course not. “Then where?”
“Three miles up the High Peaks Trail. Sitting in a tree.”
In a tree? I guess even condors don’t soar all day.
I looked up at the High Peaks, considering whether I should tackle that climb in order to add a condor to my birdwatching life list. It was late in the day. Perhaps I’ll wait until the condors come to Oregon.
