Saving the California Condor So It is Not Just on the Back of the Quarter

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

In this Democratic weekly radio address Assemblymember Pedro Nava talks about his legislation, signed into law by the Governor, which will help save the California condor. As Assemblymember Nava notes in the radio address, the image of a California condor is featured on the California quarter alongside images of John Muir and Yosemite National Park. Assembly Bill 821, authored by Nava, bans big game hunters from using lead ammunition when hunting in the condor’s range. Researchers say lead ammo consumed by the scavenger condors is killing the endangered species. Assemblymember Nava says “We must make sure the condor on your quarter is a living testament to the pristine beauty of California and not a fading memory of a lost era.”

You may listen in English or Spanish. The transcript is below.

By Pedro Nava
Member, California State Assembly
Hello. This is Assemblymember Pedro Nava.

Reach into your pocket. Take a look at your California quarter. On the back you’ll see famed environmentalist John Muir, the Yosemite Valley, and the California condor.

The condor has been a part of California’s natural landscape for over ten thousand years. That means condors flew over woolly mammoths and saber-toothed cats.

But sadly, only 140 California condors remain in the wild.

Each year, lead ammunition poisons and kills the extremely endangered California condor, North America's largest land based bird.

California condors are scavengers. They can’t kill other animals for food. So they eat animals that have been killed by hunters using lead ammunition. Eating the dead animals includes eating the lead from the bullet.

Only a few weeks ago…at the Los Angeles Zoo, a condor died after blood tests revealed lead contamination 10 times higher than it should have been.