Infestation and Extinction

[G-spotter]

250 years ago vast flocks of passenger pigeons flourished in North America, yet their bones are not often found in sites dating to a time before the arrival of Europeans. The only explanation can be that large Indian farming populations kept these competing seed-eaters scarce through deliberate extirpation, because once the Indians had been decimated by disease, the pigeon population exploded.

[tvashtarkatena]

Yet more scientific proof that the universe isn't as old as they say it is.

[Seahawks]

250 years ago vast flocks of passenger pigeons flourished in North America, yet their bones are not often found in sites dating to a time before the arrival of Europeans. The only explanation can be that large Indian farming populations kept these competing seed-eaters scarce through deliberate extirpation, because once the Indians had been decimated by disease, the pigeon population exploded.

 

I keep waiting to hear something about Passenger pigeons that someone has extracted the DNA from a dead one and inserted it into an egg of a regular pigeon. Kind of like the wooly Mamoth thing. Recreate the pigeon. That be cool. I'd imagine they have the same problem as with the Wooly Mamoth incomplete DNA.