The way of the Dodo

The passenger pigeon was once the most numerous bird species on our planet. During the 19th century it lived in enormous colonies that numbered in the hundreds of thousands and stretched many thousands of kilometres over much of northern America. It is said that during the annual migration the passage of these huge flocks overhead would quite literally turn day into night for hours on end. But, on September 1, 1914 the last past passenger pigeon known to man died in captivity in the Cincinnati Zoo.

The Huia (the largest species of New Zealand wattlebird) was endemic to the North Island of New Zealand. The Huia was remarkable for having the most pronounced sexual dimorphism in bill shape of any species of bird in the world; a trait that the Maori revered. But Europeans however, were not so reverent, and eventually the Huia also went the way of the dodo.

The Great Auk was a large flightless bird weighing 5 kilograms and standing almost a metre in height. It resembled a penguin in many ways and was reputed to have been an even better swimmer. Being clumsy on land however, the Great Auk was an obvious choice of tucker for early humans and for 100 000 years there was an equitable coexistence between the numerous native North Sea civilisations and this regal, if slightly comical, feathered creature. But extensive European exploration and colonisation of new lands during the 19th century, and an insatiable demand for the birds’ exceptionally warm down, decimated Great Auk populations. Despite being one of the first species in the world to receive environmental protection by law, the last of the Great Auks was killed on July 3, 1844 on Eldey Island in Iceland.

So why am I telling you all this, you ask?

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