










Undoubtedly it is a threat to a species that is at a very much reduced population level," says Rob Williams, Peru co-ordinator for the Frankfurt Zoological Society, who estimates there may be just 300-500 left in the wild in Peru. "We are on a threshold and if we push the condors much further over this threshold, it will be very difficult for them to recover."

The origins of the fiestas are obscure. Locals say they date back before the Incas. But it's impossible that bullfighting took place before 1528, when Francisco Pizarro brought the tradition from Spain. Now the events marry those colonial influences with the Andean worship of the condor – considered a messenger between earth and the heavens.

At Ihuayllo, a village of several hundred people living at an altitude of 3,100 metres (10,000ft), the festival begins with a parade of their captive condor, which is dressed up and pulled through the streets by the tips of its wings to the accompaniment of a brass band and the cheers of dancing locals.

It is a noisy, two-day affair fuelled by the fermented maize drink chicha and marked by no little blood. One bull is dispatched in the arena and then has its throat cut and hooves carved off in the middle of the crowd. Soon after, a spectator is gored after stumbling drunkenly into the bullring. Bleeding from the groin, he is driven to the village clinic. Seeing him carted off, a local shrugs and says: "It's a festival. This is normal."



"This has changed an awful lot in the past 40 years. Many people because of their beliefs in the importance culturally of the Yawar fiesta – because of Arguedes' book – have begun to do Yawar festivals," says Williams. "Many of these towns who say it is a very important tradition have actually only been doing it for 20, 30 or 40 years."



"I feel so lucky that this year, my year, they managed to trap a condor," he says over a glass of chicha. "If a condor isn't trapped the people can be so disappointed that sometimes they don't even go to see the bull fighting."

The bindings for the condor are sewn into the hide of the bull. Agitated by the stitches in its back, the beat of wings above its head and the matador's provocations in front of its eyes, the enraged bull storms around the ring with the condor lolling from side to side.




The sponsor's brother, Donato Rojas, says provincial authorities grant permission for Yawar fiestas to use condors, which are usually captured by using a dead horse as bait. "But if the bird dies in the fight, it can lead to fines or imprisonment."

Not long ago, the revered bird was also seen as a pest and a threat. Some herdsmen are still happier if condors are accidentally killed. "I prefer that they die because they harm my livestock. Every year they eat six or seven calves and that hurts me," says Victor Tello, a herdsman dressed, like many festival-goers, in brightly coloured Andean garb.

Drunken revellers try to pluck feathers from the birds while they are tethered close to the bullring before their fight, but the condors' handlers push them away.

The mayor of Ihuayllo, Bruno Guillen, emphasises that the regulations are designed to protect the bird. "The condor is a symbol of our region, Apurímac, and every year we have a festival with a condor," he says. "We limit its participation in the bullring to three occasions, then it is returned to those in charge of caring for it. Afterwards it is released in a farewell ceremony, with its crown and money, by way of thanks, and it returns to its home."




"El Cóndor pasa!" exclaims a joyous observer, looking up at the bird banking back and forth above the village.


Williams and others want to work with the central and local governments to change attitudes while maintaining traditional culture. "If we can't conserve the Andean condor here, then we can't conserve it anywhere," he says.