Doris Hua (10) | STAFF REPORTER
We travel centuries back to the year 1800s, in The Glorious Country of Red, White,
(Not yet, at least…)
In the 1800s, a certain species of bird (no, not KFC) were in plentitude. The males with a copper underside with blue and purple on its wings, females more muted―these glorious birds were named “passenger pigeons” based on the phrase “passing by” referring to its large migratory habits of the species. Once so abundant, passenger pigeons are estimated to make up 2 of every 5
Side Note: Has anyone ever seen a baby pigeon? No?
I knew it.
The FBI has their name written all over this one, boys.
In May 1850, Simon Pokagon, a 20-year-old
Simon Pokagon: So I went hunting the other day-
PP (Passenger Pigeons): CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW
Other guy: What?
Simon Pokagon: SO I went-
PP: CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW
Other guy: WHAT?
PP: CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW CAW
Simon Pokagon: SO I WENT HUN-
Simon Pokagon: ah nvm i give up
Simon Pokagon: ….
Simon Pokagon: Hey, who turned off the lights?
There were so many of them, all concentrated in one place, that if there were a flock migrating above you, it was said that the sun would be blocked out for days, and impossible to carry a conversation. Their species’ success in the past centuries was credited to their mass flocks and what that meant in terms of food competition, and predators. Because of the speed at which they travelled and the sheer numbers of their flocks, they would overwhelm prey; a strategy known as “predator satiation”.
Apparently, passenger pigeons were quite tasty and on the plus side for your muscles (you know you got em), full of protein! Who knew? See here for some fun Pigeon recipes. If you ever, you know, happen upon a live passenger pigeon (more on that later).
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Jimmy: DAAAD I’m hungryyy
Jimmy’s Dad: Leave me alone son I’m working
Jimmy: But I have croquet practice in an
Jimmy’s Dad: Son, *hands him a pole* go at em’ *points outside to literal flock of hundreds of millions of birds*
As well as being a nutritious meal, passenger pigeons destroyed crops, because although they only sometimes foraged in newly planted grainfields, a flock of millions in your field…might be an issue.
This, in addition to the new coming Industrial Age, with its national expansions of the telegraph and the railroad, was enough to send similar flocks (humans this time, not birds) of hunters to earn money on the new pigeon craze. Both amateurs and professionals could manage the pigeon hunt. They shot the pigeons and trapped them, torched their nests and asphyxiated them with burning sulfur. Some other weapons were the handy rake, the hefty
In the end, it was the passenger pigeon’s infamous huge masses that eventually led to their downfall. Hunters attacked the birds with brutal force until the very last numbers of birds, to the dismay of the small and meager conservation efforts that existed at the time.
Cincinnati Zoo, 1914. Martha, the last pigeon of her kind, is being displayed for the world to see. Once, her kind had eclipsed stars and announced their flocks of hundreds of millions with a thunderous noise, like anticipatory applause before a show. They would paint houses white with their ejecta and it would be a whole different type of white Christmas.
Now, disabled with infertility and a palsy that made her tremble, Martha stood in place for hours at a time, disappointing many visitors who came to see her. Some kids even threw rocks and dirt at her to try to get her to move. Her perch had to be lowered every year so that eventually, she could climb up to it instead of flying.
Martha was an incredibly special bird. She was named after the first lady, Martha Washington. The two times she had to fly on an airplane, she flew first class and escorted by a flight attendant. Classy bird! Her caretakers even attempted to secure a mate for her by offering $1000 US, amounting to around $25,000
Martha died September 1, 1914, at a spectacular 29 years old. She was immediately encased in ice and sent off to the Smithsonian to be mounted. Now preserved and until recently, she was filed away in a specimen cabinet. Now Martha is on display at the Smithsonian museum.
The rate at which the population of passenger pigeons sky-rocketed downwards speaks to the power we as humans hold over the rest of the world, the environment, and animals that live on it. Because of the fast-approaching industrial age and the arrival of new technology, we managed to kill a beautiful species in less than 50 years.
Sadly, the birth of Modern day conservatism had not yet struck when the crisis of passenger pigeons came to the world’s attention when the population had already reached unsavable numbers. Yet historians say these two events are linked together. With the mass extinction of a species so abundant and so unlikely (or so we believed) to disappear, we became aware of the true quantity of finite resources. The loss of this beautiful species was followed by many conservation laws in the next couple of years, for example, the Lacey Act, followed by the tougher Weeks-McLean Act in 1913 and, five years later, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, which protected not just birds but also their eggs, nests, and feathers. In other words, you could say that the extinction of the passenger pigeon was a tragic but crucial catalyst in the conservation movement and a turning point for environmentalism in human history.
But this is not the end of the story.
With the emergence of gene-editing technology, such as CRISPR, the new word “de-extinction” has come into play, as you can probably guess what it is: bringing those yummy pigeon stews back into existence.
According to the organization revive&restore, their plan of action is “to release the first test flocks between 2030 and 2040, eventually reaching a target of self-sustaining population growth with 10,000 birds in the wild.”
Keep those recipes in your pocket, for we might be having to grab those poles anytime soon now!
Arguably, de-extinction could result in ethical and environmental problems not foreseen by scientists. Introducing a once extinct (either by the laws of nature or human) species could be seen as too close to “playing the role of God”, and among other ethical problems, produce new and even worse problems among already-existing species.
Some scientists have even proposed injecting the passenger pigeon gene with dinosaur DNA to bring the species back to life, and this situation quite frankly begs one question:
Haven’t we learned anything from Jurassic Park?
