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Sep. 1st, 2004 05:57 pmFrom today's Writer's Almanac:
On this day in 1914, Martha, the last remaining passenger pigeon, died at the Cincinnati Zoo. It was frozen into a block of ice and sent to the Smithsonian Institution to be skinned and mounted. Passenger pigeons were at one time the most numerous birds on the planet, with billions of them living in the eastern and southern United States. They would fill a tree with as many as a hundred nests. Migrating flocks hundreds of miles long would darken the sky for several days as they passed overhead.
Passenger pigeons were hunted for hog feed and shipped to big cities. In the mid-1800's their numbers fell since they laid only one egg at a time. Nearly all of the remaining quarter million Passenger Pigeons were killed in one day in 1896 by hunters who knew they were shooting at the last wild flock.
On this day in 1914, Martha, the last remaining passenger pigeon, died at the Cincinnati Zoo. It was frozen into a block of ice and sent to the Smithsonian Institution to be skinned and mounted. Passenger pigeons were at one time the most numerous birds on the planet, with billions of them living in the eastern and southern United States. They would fill a tree with as many as a hundred nests. Migrating flocks hundreds of miles long would darken the sky for several days as they passed overhead.
Passenger pigeons were hunted for hog feed and shipped to big cities. In the mid-1800's their numbers fell since they laid only one egg at a time. Nearly all of the remaining quarter million Passenger Pigeons were killed in one day in 1896 by hunters who knew they were shooting at the last wild flock.