California Condor Eben McMillan 14 January 1964 It showered lightly here at Cholame during the night, but the sky had cleared during the early morning hours. Ian and I left for Fillmore and Hopper Canyon at 5:00 A.M., via the Coast Route, but turned eastward at Cholame when we encountered heavy ground fog in the Cholame Valley and proceeded by way of Blackwell's Corner, Tufts, and Grapevine Canyon. As we approached the mouth of Grapevine Canyon we found our progress halted by the Ridge Route being closed due to snow and ice at the higher elevations. We were held here for about an hour when the traffic was allowed to move on, supposedly with chains only, but even those who had chains did not put them on and with total disregard for the pleading of highway patrol officers everyone drove on up and over the grade with no difficulty in any way. Hard squalls of sleet were falling in the Lebec area. Snow capped the Frazier and surrounding mountains and a thin cover of snow was in the Castaic Valley and on Holland Summit although the sun was shining at Borman and only traces of snow could be seen south of the Holland Summit on down towards Castaic Junction. We visited the Dead pit of Newhall Land and Cattle Company at Castaic Junction. No sign of scavengers could be found although a new black carrion had been dumped here lately to add to the three other carcasses that were slow to disintegrate at this season of year when cool temperatures kept the activities of maggots at a minimum. We talked to a Mr. Arnold, one of the Cowboys who were shipping and weighing cattle from the feed lot. He said that