Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Biological Conservation journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/biocon Review Ecology and conservation of a rare species: What do we know and what may we do to preserve Andean condors? Pablo I. Plaza ⁎ , Sergio A. Lambertucci Grupo de Investigaciones en Biología de la Conservación, INIBIOMA - CONICET, Universidad Nacional del Comahue, Quintral 1250 (R8400FRF), Bariloche, Argentina ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Human disturbances Lead contamination Poisoning Scavenger conservation Threats Vultures ABSTRACT While scientifc knowledge is consistently increasing for several species of conservation concern, mitigating their population declines continues to be a great challenge globally. This is the case of the Andean condor (Vultur gryphus) in South America. Scientifc information on this species has increased steeply in the last years, but their population declines continue. Here, we review and analyze the scientifc information available about Andean condors ecology with implications for its conservation. We also evaluate published and unpublished information about the diferent threats afecting their populations. Finally, we propose conservation actions based on ac- quired scientifc knowledge, which should be of help for conservation managers and policy makers. The increase in scientifc information on this species was mainly focused on subject areas as key habitats for roosting and breeding, food sources, intra and interspecifc interaction, human-condor relationships, movement ecology, genetic composition, and health information. Worryingly, good demographic information is still lacking (e.g., population density, breeding success, age and sex-specifc survival rates) which prevents the assessment of the population viability. The most important threats afecting condor populations that require urgent actions are poisoning with pesticides and lead contamination. Illegal shooting, impacts produced by human infrastructure and cultural threats are other threats afecting this species. There is not much scientifc information on the potential efects of veterinary drugs ingestion, impacts of carnivore traps, pathogen microorganisms and dis- turbances produced by tourism or climbing activities. Importantly, the actual population impacts of most of the mentioned threats are still unknown. Although some basic ecological studies are still needed (e.g., demography), conservation policies should incorporate scientifc knowledge acquired in the last years to produce better results and reverse population declines for this species. 1. Introduction Anthropogenic activities and disturbances (e.g., changes in land use, pollution, over exploitation) are responsible for the sixth massive ex- tinction of species (Barnosky et al., 2011; Ceballos et al., 2015). Today, biodiversity loss is one of the most important environmental problems afecting diverse ecosystems globally (Ceballos et al., 2010) with sev- eral species under threat and showing catastrophic population declines (McCallum, 2015). In the last years, there was a remarkable increment of scientifc information especially focused on species of conservation concern (Hofmann et al., 2010; McClure et al., 2018). This scientifc knowledge is relevant to plan conservation policies and actions for target species (Pullin and Knight, 2003). However, most of the current conservation practices have not been based on systematic scientifc evidence produced by experiments or systematic reviews (Pullin et al., 2004; Pullin and Knight, 2003; Sutherland et al., 2004) and this will afect the efectiveness of species protection. Under this scenario, reversing the extinction process of species could represent a great challenge. Vultures are one of the most threatened avian groups in the world (Buechley and Şekercioğlu, 2016). Around 70% of vulture species are showing important populations declines due to anthropogenic dis- turbances, especially in Africa and Asia, but also in other continents where they occur (Buechley and Şekercioğlu, 2016; Ogada et al., 2012). They are particularly afected by threats such as lead contamination (Plaza and Lambertucci, 2018a), intentional and unintentional poi- soning (Ogada, 2014; Plaza et al., 2019a), loss of food sources, trade of parts and persecution (Ogada et al., 2012). This is concerning given the important ecosystem services they provide, cleaning organic material from the environment, which in turn could be of importance for human health and economy (Grilli et al., 2019; Plaza et al., 2020a). While scientifc information about this avian group has increased in the last years, reversing the decline of their populations continues to be a great challenge and current conservation policies are apparently insufcient https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2020.108782 Received 5 June 2020; Received in revised form 18 August 2020; Accepted 27 August 2020 ⁎ Corresponding author. E-mail address: plazapablo@comahue-conicet.gob.ar (P.I. Plaza). Biological Conservation 251 (2020) 108782 0006-3207/ © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. T