Martha
Martha
1885-1914
The last passenger pigeon on Earth died September 1, 1914, at the Cincinnati Zoo (The Cincinnati Zoo). She was 29 years old. Martha was born (hatched) at the Zoo. Her body was packed in ice and sent to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C., where it was skinned and mounted.
Ectopistes migratorius was believed to number three to five billion in North America when the first European settlers came in 1565 (to St. Augustine, FL). John Audubon wrote in 1813 of a flock of passenger pigeons estimated being about one billion. Passenger Pigeons were once 25-40% of the total bird population in the US. They ranged from Ontario, Canada, to Texas and east to Florida. The main nesting area was from the Michigan Great Lakes to New York.
Passenger Pigeons had grace, speed and maneuverability. A Passenger Pigeon averaged 16.5" in length for a male. The Passenger Pigeon could fly in excess of 60 mph, and would migrate hundreds of miles to find suitable nesting and feeding grounds. Scolding and chattering when they settled down at night could be heard for miles. They preferred chestnut, birch, oak, maple, and pine forests. They feasted on the nuts and nested in the branches. Tree branches would break under the weight of Passenger Pigeons and their nests. A pair of Passenger Pigeons would raise a single offspring. Nests were 1' in diameter, a single egg incubated for 12-14 days.
The Passenger Pigeon was a colonial and gregarious bird and needed large numbers for optimal breeding conditions. Because they were communal, and lived in groups, they were easy targets for humans, but were able to survive natural predators such as wolves, and foxes.
Man used the Passenger Pigeon for food and feathers for pillows and mattresses. They were shot also just for the sport of it. Even though forest area gave way to homes and grain fields for farmers, numbers remained stable.
In 1896 the last remaining flock settled down to nest. All 250,000 were killed in one day by sportsmen who gathered to shoot the last wild flock in Petoskey Michigan, as advertized-which brought sportsmen to the area. When hunters began shooting to sell them is when their number began declining rapidly. Reasons for the extinction of the Passenger Pigeon are: reckless over-hunting and constant disturbance of nesting colonies.
Its close cousin, the Morning Dove, has learned to successfully cohabit with man. There are no more 'vast forests' that the Passenger Pigeon required.
The term 'Stool Pigeon' term comes from the following practice: A Passenger Pigeon had its eyes sewn shut and was tied to a stool and used as live decoys so Passenger Pigeon hunters would have an easier shot.
The last wild birds were kept in a shed by a well-meaning scientist who bought the birds from a Wisconsin dealer in 1896. They did not have the right diet or the necessary stimuli for breeding. Passenger Pigeons are used to the company of hundreds or thousands of their kind. But the last birds just sat on their perches staring. All efforts at captive breeding failed. They began dying one by one. The Cincinnati Zoo purchased the remaining birds in 1902 (added to their existing ones) which dwindled to 3 birds: two males, one female. The males died in 1910 and 1912. Martha died September 1, 1914.
Martha is memorialized in poems, books, and songs.
'Martha, (Last of the Passenger Pigeons)' by John Herald
(John Herald; guitar, vocal; Cindy Cashdollar, Dobro; Caroline Dutton, fiddle;
George Quinn, bass. Recorded live at Joyous Lake, Woodstock, May 26, 1983.)
The extinction of the Passenger Pigeon aroused public interest in the need for strong conservation laws.
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