In 1987, the last wild California condor was captured. The species was so close to extinction — just 22 birds left on earth — that wildlife biologists made the extraordinary decision to bring them all into captivity rather than watch the last ones disappear.
That decision, controversial at the time, is why a condor egg is now sitting in a redwood tree in Northern California for the first time in more than a century.
**The Nest in the Redwood**
A pair of California condors — designated **A0** and **A1** — have been observed repeatedly visiting a nest site deep inside **Redwood National and State Parks** in Northern California, taking turns remaining at the nest for extended periods. Their behaviour is consistent with incubating an egg. The egg is believed to have been laid in **early February 2026**.
If successful, it could hatch by late March or early April — following the species' typical 55 to 58-day incubation period.
The female, **A0**, carries a Yurok name: **Ney-gem' 'Ne-chweenkah** — *"She carries our prayers."* The male, **A1**, is named **Hlow Hoo-let** — *"At last we fly!"*
Both birds are nearly seven years old and were among the first cohort released in **2022** by the **Yurok Tribe's Northern California Condor Restoration Program** — a historic effort to return the condor to lands from which it vanished over 100 years ago.
**A Species That Came Back From 22 Birds**
The recovery of the California condor is one of the most intensive and expensive wildlife conservation programmes ever attempted. After the last wild bird was captured in 1987, San Diego Zoo and Los Angeles Zoo began a meticulous captive breeding programme. The first birds were released back into the wild in 1992.
Progress was slow, then remarkable:
🦅 **1987:** 22 birds total — all in captivity 🦅 **1992:** First reintroductions to wild 🦅 **2003:** 100+ birds in existence 🦅 **December 2025:** **607 condors** — 392 flying free in the wild
The condor is now found in California, Arizona, Utah, Baja California, and Baja California Sur. But Northern California — where the Yurok people have lived for thousands of years — had been silent for a century.
**The Yurok Programme**
The Yurok Tribe did not wait to be asked to help. In 2003, they formally declared their intention to restore the condor to their ancestral territory on the Klamath River. It took nearly two decades of planning, permitting, and partnership before the first birds were released on Yurok land in 2022.
For the Yurok, the condor — *prey-go-neesh* — is a sacred figure, the highest-flying bird, a symbol of the health of the land itself. When the species disappeared, it was experienced as a loss that went beyond biology.
Now, two birds released from that programme appear to be raising the first Northern California condor chick in over 100 years.
**What Happens Next**
The nest is in a remote area of the redwood forest, deliberately undisturbed by wildlife officials who are tracking the birds via transmitters rather than visual observation. The Yurok Tribe, the National Park Service, and the US Fish and Wildlife Service are all monitoring the situation carefully but from a distance — allowing the birds to do what they were brought back to do.
If the egg hatches, the chick will be the first condor born in Northern California in living memory.
The name the Yurok chose for A0 — *She carries our prayers* — turns out to have been exactly right. 🦅
*Sources: Los Angeles Times (March 2026) · CAP Radio · Smithsonian Magazine · Yurok Tribe Northern California Condor Restoration Program · US Fish and Wildlife Service*
