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passenger pigeons
what meanings do we give to nature

Passenger pigeon: billions of birds in the 1870s to dozens in the 1890s
what happened?

passenger pigeons being shot
extinction of the passenger pigeon became a symbol that nature is not limitless
pile of dead pigeons

What were people thinking?

The Seneca Indians in upstate New York

the birds were depleted on the east coast by the 1750s and as transportation to market allowed, large scale hunting moved to the upper midwest

As the pigeon population declined

Once pigeons were extinct they became a modern-day parable

we use nature to tell our own morality stories