Image from the Biodiversity Heritage Library.
Contributed by Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley.
| www.biodiversitylibrary.org
Transcription
California Condor
Eben McMillan
10 June 1964
Miles Northwest of Arenal. This young Eagle could possibly
have been hit by a car as it fed on some mammal that
had been roadkilled but from all appearance, I would
judge it to have been shot from the back as it perched on
the power pole that stood close-by where it lay. The Tail
feathers showed much white. The Carcass could have been
there for three months, or more.
Driving North of Coalinga, on Highway 33, while still in
the foothills but about to emerge out on the flats, I saw
an immature Golden Eagle Circling some distance to my
West. After Circling briefly this Eagle flew towards, and
over me, heading eastward. An adult Golden Eagle
was observed near the Cantua Creek bridge as it passed
in front of me, then skimmed low over a rise, behind
which Atriplex (Poly Carpa) was growing. This Eagle was no
doubt, hunting.
I drove up Cantua Creek to the Lyle Christie Ranch
that is located in the bottom of this creek, the Ranch buildings,
that is. It is on this Ranch where Kenneth Mutton had been working
last spring when he was supposed to have seen Condor. The Ranch
buildings are situated up Cantua Creek about five miles
from the Highway 33 turnoff. The Countryside is rolling hills
that are deeply scarred with gullies and rock outcrops
that, in some instances, run for more than ½ mile, forming
slides and cliffs that serve as good nesting and roosting
sites for Raven-Barn Owls, Sparrow Hawks, Cliff Swallows,
and White Throated Swifts. The Cantua Creek itself, —