Parque de Condor

Several pictures of the Andean Condor. They are very endangered as there are only 90 left in the world. The male has a crest on his front, and their wing span is about 6 feet. They are not really a bird of prey as they eat things that are already dead rather than kill their food themselves. So yes you are right they are a vulture.




Us at the park, Volcano Imbabura, known as Papa Imbabura in the background.

An American Eagle, he was beautiful, made me homesick.

Birds in flight.



Compare the size of these birds.


Águila Pechinegra (black-breasted eagle) she is actually a type of gavilán(hawk), not really and eagle. This is Reina and she once flew away for 4 days but returned to the park. This is their home now and their territory.



A añcón (falcon), they fly very fast, up to 250 km per hour.

Gavilán a la Castaña - the chestnut hawk

Saturday April 23, 2011
Sister Dresen will be leaving in a week and she had wanted to make one more trip to Otavalo. So we got the van and a driver and headed out early this morning. We stopped at Mira Lejo to purchase some special scarves that a weaver here hand makes. Then we went to the Parque de Condor. It was an interesting ride to the park, very steep, dirt roads which had large gullies because of the rain we have had. When we arrived it was a beautiful park, right on the edge of the mountain. They rescue birds and care for them. Many of the birds die because they are brought in when they are so close to death there is nothing that can be done. The founders of the park are trying to teach the people not to kill these birds of prey as they rid the fields of mice and other pests. The people fear the large birds will attack their animals. It seems that the old ways of honoring even worshiping these birds has changed to a fear of them. A sad result of this is many of these birds are endangered. There are only 90 Condors left in the world 70 of them are in Ecuador, many live in this area high on the volcanoes. Some of the condors living in the wild come to the park to visit the condors that live here. Don´t they look like the vultures in some of the old cartoons?