I Seek Out Endangered Species In The Wild Like Pokemon. Here’s What I’ve Learned.

After hours of scanning with my binoculars, I dropped my pack and took a 30-minute breather on a sweeping plateau. It was 1996, and I was tired from searching for endangered California condors, which had been released into the wild just 4 years prior. I wasn’t having any luck.

Back in 1992, the rugged, serpentine ridgeline of the Sierra Madre Mountains in Los Padres National Forest was the staging area for releasing the vultures, with the hope of reestablishing the iconic Pleistocene-era raptors in their historic backcountry habitat. Over the first half of the last century, lead poisoning, habitat loss, and egg collecting had delivered a heavy blow to the largest flying land bird in North America. Re-entering these birds into the wild was giving them a second shot at survival.

Back in 1996, the colossal sandstone cathedral I was standing on was the best perch to spot condors soaring in late afternoon thermal updrafts. After backpacking 10 miles west of the arid Cuyama Valley, the long, steep switchbacks on the Rocky Ridge Trail eventually led to the sandstone gorge of Lion Canyon. Its 5,000-foot-plus elevation and strategic location for linking up other vital habitats north and south meant Lion Canyon was integral for the condors’ potential survival. The birds coveted the many caves and alcoves carved out of the pliable sandstone, which offered ideal habitat for perching and nesting in one of their last great bastions of the Santa Barbara backcountry.

But if I thought it would be easy to spot a bird with a 9-foot-wide wingspan, I quickly found out that it wasn’t that simple. Condors average about 150 miles a day as they soar over their realm, seeking out carrion in the mountains, grasslands, even along rugged coasts such as Big Sur. Nesting habitats require cliffs and rock outcroppings that provide caves and alcoves to lay a single egg.

I lay down, using my backpack as a pillow, and closed my eyes beneath the shifting clouds. When I opened them again, I was blown away to see a lone California condor soaring directly overhead. I was thrilled, though the thought crossed my mind that the condor had likely mistaken me for a carcass.

Condors are generally curious raptors, and whether it was sizing me up as dinner or not, its incredible eyesight spotted me from miles away. As I slowly reached for my camera, the condor made several passes overhead before landing about 30 feet away. It was a special moment, staring into the eyes of a species that has been teetering on the brink of extinction.

Today there are several hundred California condors in the wild. They are still critically endangered, but more are being released into their old haunts across the west. These birds are crucial to the cycle of life in remote regions of the wilderness because they scavenge carcasses of dead animals. Tribes such as the Chumash consider condors to be the cleaners of the forest.

Last year the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service celebrated the 50-year anniversary of the Endangered Species Act. California, with all its diverse habitats, possesses 113 endangered animals, the most of any state. Backpacking, paddling, and climbing to get a glimpse of an endangered species has become a priority for me.

Keeping the “Wild” in the “Wilderness”

No place is truly wild without wildlife. A habitat, wilderness, or ecosystem doesn’t function properly without it: Just imagine not hearing birdsong, a lizard scurrying through crackling leaves, or coyotes howling on a distant plain. Silence in a wilderness setting can be soothing, but when it means the absence of the animals that should live there, it can also mean ecological death.

Many of North America’s wild places possess endangered flora and fauna that need our help to thrive.  For many of these organisms, longevity isn’t guaranteed. But if the habitat is there, then there’s a chance for survival and an opportunity for recovery.

Above Treeline

In 2019, I hit the trailhead at Cottonwood Lakes in the Eastern Sierra three hours before sunset. I skirted past the shimmering alpine lakes and veered off toward New Army Pass. Above the treeline, I trudged upward on long switchbacks toward a granite plateau with stupendous views of Mt. Langley, one of California’s fifteen 14,000-foot peaks.

My target: The Sierra bighorn, a critically endangered herbivore struggling to survive in the Eastern Sierra. As of October 2023, only about 360 remain in those high granite peaks. Spotting one bighorn or even a small herd is a challenge; the tan-colored sheep camouflages seamlessly into their Eastern Sierra habitat.

Added to the Endangered Species List in January 2000, Sierra bighorn are stout, nimble browsers. Their curled horns make them distinct from their desert and Rocky Mountain cousins. Instead of tightly curling, their horns splay outward.

After topping out above New Army Pass, I had a commanding view of the vast, seemingly barren plateau leading north to Mt. Langley, talus and granite slabs swept in soft pinkish hues. I bedded down in a “granite nest,” bivvying beneath shooting stars and chirping marmots, pikas, and golden-mantled squirrels.

As the sun breached the Inyo Mountains to the east, I propped myself up against a granite slab wrapped in my sleeping bag. Pulling my knees up to my chest, I scanned the massive plateau for wildlife seeking warmth on the granite. There were plenty of marmots belly crawling across the gritty granite, but then I caught a glimpse of a rack cresting the sweeping plateau.

A Sierra bighorn ram nimbly traversed stacks of blocky talus, posing for me at roughly 12,000 feet with the entirety of the Western Sierra as a dramatic backdrop. Another, younger one soon followed, and both headed toward the Golden Trout Wilderness.

There are things we can do to support the Sierra bighorn population: While backpacking and hiking, keep your distance (you can see them just as well with binoculars) and keep dogs on leashes in bighorn sheep habitat. Disease from ranch animals like sheep are an issue for them.

The Grassland Biome

Over the last several years, I’ve made five treks from my home base on the coast in Carpinteria, California, to Carrizo Plain National Monument in the state’s central valley. From the coast, this requires traversing over four mountain ranges and crossing two rivers before reaching the last of California’s grasslands.

Seven days into a trip in 2015, I pitched my tent on the grassland floor of the Carrizo Plain and soaked in the grandiose landscape. Of California’s 113 endangered species, 13 of those exist in the Carrizo Plain, home to more endangered species than anywhere else in the Golden State. This is the last grassland habitat in California; the 250,000-acre ecosystem is the last, best bastion for endangered blunt-nosed leopard lizards, San Joaquin Valley kit foxes, antelope ground squirrels, and giant kangaroo rats. Generally speaking, with endangered species, habitat loss is the biggest concern, so preserving these areas is crucial. What they need is more wildlife corridors, more native plants, and fewer non-native plants.

The tiny giant kangaroo rat is the keystone species of the grasslands. I’ve heard many times from various biologists monitoring all things Carrizo Plain, “as the giant kangaroo rat goes, so goes the Carrizo Plain.” They’re also the most important animal out there. If they went extinct, the entire grassland habitat would collapse.

Their old or abandoned burrows become cover and renovated homes for a throng of species including American badgers, kit foxes, blunt-nosed leopard lizards, burrowing owls, antelope ground squirrels, and long-tailed weasels. The hippity-hop rodent with almond-shaped eyes, big feet, and long tail is also prey for the above-mentioned, as well as the various species of raptors that frequent the grasslands for a meal. Their constant mowing around their burrows encourages healthy browsing habitat for tule elk and pronghorn antelope.

Surrounding my tent were surefire signs of the frenetic, nocturnal giant kangaroo rats: long, narrow tracks that came in and out of nearby burrows. With my headlamp on, I spotted multiple pairs of eyes all belonging to the bouncing rodents.

The soundtrack to kangaroo rat country is a series of long, repetitive drumrolls: They stomp their feet to communicate with one another, in a kind of grassland Morse code. The drumrolls went on well into the evening, lulling me into a deep slumber until a pack of coyotes howled beneath the stars, momentarily silencing the thumping sounds.

Their silence was brief, and then the drumbeat continued.