170 years ago....

C

Clint

Active member
Either yesterday or today, the last 2 Great Auks were killed on Eldey Island, off the coast of Iceland. The pair was killed and their egg crushed in the chase. Because if their rarity during their final years, large rewards were paid for skins by the top museums for their collections. So the penguin of the North faded into oblivion.

Clint
 
A sad day..

The Grand Pingouin.
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Clint~

I think I read Allan Eckert's "The Great Auk" when it came out in 1963 (I was 10). His "Silent Sky" is another fine book - about the Passenger Pigeon.

Sure would love to see a Carolina Parakeet and an Eskimo Curlew, too....

All the best,

SJS
 
Steve,

I have both of those, as well as Schroger's book on passenger pigeons. Would love to get Wiley's book on Carolina Patakeet....but last price I saw was $1000....so it will have to wait.

Hornaday's book (1913 I think) is a good read.

Clint
 
Steve,

I have both of those, as well as Schroger's book on passenger pigeons. Would love to get Wiley's book on Carolina Patakeet....but last price I saw was $1000....so it will have to wait.

Hornaday's book (1913 I think) is a good read.

Clint
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I don't know about you cerebral literature-lovin' types, I just get tats of extinct birds.
 
Clint~

I think I read Allan Eckert's "The Great Auk" when it came out in 1963 (I was 10). His "Silent Sky" is another fine book - about the Passenger Pigeon.

Sure would love to see a Carolina Parakeet and an Eskimo Curlew, too....

All the best,

SJS
Click to expand...

Steve,
That last known Passenger Pigeon was named Martha and she died in the Cincinnati Zoo in 1914. She can now be seen at the Smithsonian.
Al
Al
 
[/QUOTE]

Steve,
That last known Passenger Pigeon was named Martha and she died in the Cincinnati Zoo in 1914. She can now be seen at the Smithsonian.
Al
Al [/QUOTE]


As did the last captive Carolina Parakeet, 1918 - but I think they were seen wild for a while after that.
 
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Martha died Sept 1st 1914, 100 years ago this fall. The Migratory Bird Treaty with Canada was signed August 16, 1916. The end of the of commercial exploitation, feather trade and market hunting started as a result of extinctions.
 

Steve,
That last known Passenger Pigeon was named Martha and she died in the Cincinnati Zoo in 1914. She can now be seen at the Smithsonian.
Al [/QUOTE]


As did the last captive Carolina Parakeet, 1918 - but I think they were seen wild for a while after that.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for bringing that one up about the Carolina parakeet, Tod. I had forgotten about them and shouldn't have. I know that in the reading that I have done about the passenger pigeons, they keep on making the message quite clear back then that in the early 1900s these birds were the only "KNOWN" survivors at the time. It was a pity that just a few years earlier in 1909/1910, that the two males that they had in the zoo couldn't get the job done with Martha. I believe Martha was too old by then to lay eggs.
Clint, thanks for bringing this up.
Al
 
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There is a place on Rt. 66, north of Marienville, PA called Pigeon. I hunted there for many years, and always stopped and read the Pa Historical Marker, that tells about the Passenger Pigeon. It was a famous roost and feeding area for the birds, and hunting grounds as well. I can only imagine the pigeon flights, Chestnut trees, Oaks, Beechnut and White Pine that once were in a place now called Allegheny National Forest.
 
There is a place on Rt. 66, north of Marienville, PA called Pigeon. I hunted there for many years, and always stopped and read the Pa Historical Marker, that tells about the Passenger Pigeon. It was a famous roost and feeding area for the birds, and hunting grounds as well. I can only imagine the pigeon flights, Chestnut trees, Oaks, Beechnut and White Pine that once were in a place now called Allegheny National Forest.
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Vince, who knows but maybe some of Audubon's travels took him through that area you were in. After reading his accounts of watching a particular flock of migrating pigeons that lasted for several days and had a tendency to blot out the sun, one can only try and visualize what that must have looked like. Thanks for your input on this.
Al
 
Al

It took me a while, but I dug out my August 2011, issue of Gray's Sporting Journal. Under the Traditions section is: A Pioneer Pigeon Shoot by James Fenimore Cooper (from The Pioneers, of the Sources of the Susquehanna, Charles Wiley, 1823).

I highly recommend all hunters, and conservation minded folks to read it. American history for better or worse, and a real eye opener about the Passenger Pigeon. Every time that I walk the woods, streams, and fields of PA, and western NY. I think about what it must have been like in the past?
 
I have more thoughts as we get closer to September....just a couple of interesting facts...Martha was thought to be 29 when she died....old for a dove/pigeon. The last captive Carolina Parakeet died in the same aviary Martha did.

Clint
 
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