SAN DIEGO (April 11, 2024) – San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance has welcomed the 250th California condor to hatch at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park. The chick’s parents are Xol-Xol (pronounced “hole-hole”)—the first California condor brought into human care under the California Condor Recovery Program in 1982—and Mexwe (pronounced “mex-weh”). More than 40 years since the California condor population dropped to a low of just 22 birds, this milestone is a significant success.

What’s the buzz about pollinators? Here’s a look at how mighty these tiny species are.

LA JOLLA, Calif. (Feb. 26, 2024) – Love is in the water for the critically endangered Sunflower Sea Star as a team in California successfully spawned and cross-fertilized gametes from a male and a female, resulting in fertile eggs. This success marks another incredible step forward in an ongoing collaborative effort to save the species from extinction. This advancement took place at Birch Aquarium at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, where their experts were joined by partners from the Aquarium of the Pacific, California Academy of Sciences, San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance (SDZWA) and Sunflower Star Laboratory. 

SAN DIEGO (Feb. 22, 2024) – San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance (SDZWA) took an important step forward in having giant pandas return to the San Diego Zoo by signing a cooperative agreement with China Wildlife Conservation Association and filing a permit application with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

SAN DIEGO (Feb. 14, 2024) – It's a match! In the world of conservation, pairing a perfect couple is more than just a romantic endeavor; it could be the key to saving an endangered species. San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance (SDZWA) is playing Cupid for the critically endangered ‘alalā, a unique bird found only in Hawai‘i. In a new, unconventional study recently published in the journal Animal Conservation, SDZWA scientists hoping to hone their matchmaking skills applied personality traits to these crow relatives to find love connections to result in successfully fertilized eggs.

SAN DIEGO (Jan. 30, 2024) – San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance and San Diego State University (SDSU) are joining forces to usher in a new way of studying snakes. In a collaboration between San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance and Rulon Clark, Ph.D., professor of biology at SDSU, biologists are tagging wild rattlesnakes with external transmitters and accelerometers. Previously, telemetry devices on snakes had to be surgically implanted—severely limiting this area of study. San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance and SDSU are among the first to use acceleration technology to study snakes.

SAN DIEGO (Jan. 19, 2024) – Three baby spider monkeys confiscated at the United States-Mexico border are now safely with the wildlife care specialists at San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance.

SAN DIEGO (Jan. 9, 2024) – To apply cutting-edge technology to the conservation of koalas, San Diego Wildlife Alliance is partnering with Illumina, a leading genomic sequencing technology company, through the Illumina iConserve program to sequence the whole genomes (an individual’s complete set of DNA) of nearly 100 koalas residing in North America over the past 30 years. Whole genome sequencing is integral to learning more about Koala Retrovirus, KoRV – a virus that can insert into the koala genome and is associated with various health issues in koalas including immunosuppression and cancer.

SAN DIEGO (Jan. 1, 2024) – Today San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance participated in the 135th Rose Parade^® presented by Honda with a float celebrating the San Diego Zoo’s 107-year history. The float themed “It Began With a Roar” depicted iconic wildlife from the Zoo, including Rex the lion, whose mighty roar sparked a dream more than a century ago and inspired the world-renowned San Diego Zoo. 

SAN DIEGO (Dec. 22, 2023) – A collaborative effort between San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, regional fire departments, and the San Diego County Sheriff's Department has led to the installation of an innovative helicopter water tank at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park. This strategic tank— funded by California Assemblymember Brian Maienschein—aims to bolster the region's wildfire response capabilities in Escondido and surrounding areas.