Flight performance in Andean condors  & EL CONDOR PASA                                                                             "Physical limits of flight performance in the heaviest soaring bird" 

Andean condor soars above the Patagonian steppe.
Image credit: Facundo Vital (photographer).

Flapping during flight incurs high energy costs for large birds. However, the conditions under which large birds flap their wings are unclear. Hannah Williams, Emily Shepard, et al. examined how the Andean condor, the heaviest known soaring bird, can fly with limited flapping. The authors equipped eight immature condors in the Andes near Bariloche, Argentina with bio-logging devices in multiple field seasons from 2013 to 2018. The birds flapped for 1.3% of the total recorded flight time and spent the rest of the time gliding and soaring. One bird flew continuously for more than 5 hours, covering more than 170 km without flapping. More than 70% of flapping was associated with takeoffs, highlighting the importance of this phase for the total flight costs in Andean condors. Flapping was also most frequent in early morning, when thermal updrafts begin to form and the air rises slowly. The authors predicted that even during winter, when soaring conditions are poor, Andean condors may flap for no more than approximately 2 seconds per kilometer. The findings provide potential insight into how large, extinct animals possibly flew long distances by soaring rather than wing flapping, according to the authors. — M.S.

"Physical limits of flight performance in the heaviest soaring bird," by H.J. Williams, et al.

https://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1907360117

El Condor Pasa, zarzuela recopilada en 1913 por Daniel Alomia Robles https://youtu.be/nx6NI4_jOTI




THIS IS THE ONE THAT WAS MADE A POP HIT BY SIMON & GARFUNKEL
INTRODUCING NORTH AMERICANS TO WORLD MUSIC WAY BACK WHEN 



HERE IS THE ORIGINAL 1963 HIT THAT S&G COPIED





AND WHERE WOULD WE BE WITHOUT THE FAMOUS SIREN OF THE ANDES HERSELF YMA SUMAC 
DOING A VERSION