California condors once filled the skies from Baja to British Columbia. The giant scavenging bird had a wingspan of 10 feet.

But with European settlement, the population crashed. Condors were victims of poisoning that targeted large predators like wolves.

Now, the greatest known killer of these highly endangered birds is a different kind of poisoning – it comes from ingesting lead bullet fragments in dead animals.

For our EarthFix series about birds and lead hunting ammunition, Jes Burns reports that an effort to reintroduce the condor in the Pacific Northwest would place them right in harm’s way.