california condor Eben Mcmillan 16 July 1963 I spent a windy night camped out on a rocky flat one mile south of Tehachapi. It was quite cool during the night. The wind that blew most of yesterday afternoon and all night kept up the pace today. A west by northwest direction seemed to be the prevailing direction from whence this wind blew. The natives tell me this wind blows a good deal of the time in summer and fall. I drove to Oak Creek Canyon area but found the sheep had left that area. Most of the range area surrounding the Tehachapi Valley has already been cleaned of most edible vegetation, by sheep. Over-grazed would do poorly in describing its condition at present. Generally speaking, the country around Tehachapi Valley is poor and poorly kept. There seems to be a building boom going on in the Tehachapi Valley. At the southwest part of the townsite many new homes are either under construction or else have been erected within the last two or three years, and a building development two miles west of the town, called Oak Knoll Estates seems to be enjoying some success. The summer climate of Tehachapi Valley is very tolerable. In the town of Tehachapi I met two old-timers of the area. Sam Cuddeback was born in the Tehachapi Valley area 76 years ago and has never been far away during the intervening years. Sam Cuddeback has only seen condor once in his life. That was on an evening about 10 or 12 years ago when from the town of Tehachapi he and Jim Davis saw a flock of large birds circling one mile south of the town. Sam said that both he and Davis recognized these birds to be unusual, so hopping into their car, they drove to the area where the big birds were circling. No sooner had both men reached the area than the birds dropped down and alighted on a flat area that was covered with big granite boulders. While Mr. Cuddeback and Mr. Davis, were watching—