Hey there, friends, and welcome to episode 252 of Just the Zoo of Us. In this week's episode, I am joined by a

biodiversity champion for a journey through the skies of Argentina on some of the biggest wings in the

world. We are talking about the important role of scavengers as nature's sanitation engineers,

the cascading impacts of poison on

entire ecosystems, how communities can work together to make ecological miracles happen,

what's up with the puppets, and so much more. Just the Zoo of Us presents the Andean

Condor with Kai Gomez Dairs. Hello, everybody, it's Ellen Weatherford. I'm here with Just the Zoo of Us, your favorite

animal review podcast. I'm really excited this week. I have a brand new friend to introduce to

you all to talk about a really cool animal today. This is Kai Gomez-Dares. Say hi, Kai. Hi, everyone.

And Kai, what are your pronouns real quick? He they. Thank you so much. I'm so excited to talk

about this animal because it is adjacent to an animal that I have done a really deep dive on in the past.

So this is something that like I'm obviously very passionate about like this type of animal. So

excited to go into your experiences with this animal and your insight into them before we talk about

our really cool animal for this week. I'd like to talk about you. Kai, what got you into animals?

Well, I've always been an animal kid. I've watched Animal Planet since forever and I'm autistic,

so animals are a huge special interest for me ever since I've spoken, I'm pretty sure.

I've always loved them very much and I've always known I wanted to do something with them.

And so when I graduated high school, I started biology, which I struggled with pretty greatly,

especially because the pandemic hit in my second year.

And so...

Ooh!

Oof!

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