I’m struggling to remember the details, but I recall one account where somebody found a very rare, very endangered bird with its nest, strangled the bird and smashed the eggs within the nest, effectively just for shits and giggles. I’ll edit and update this if I can find the details.
Edit: The Great Auk. Wasn’t killed for shits and giggles, but they were desired for their down to the point the European populations were hunted into extinction. From Wikipedia:
The last pair, found incubating an egg, was killed there on 3 June 1844, on request from a merchant who wanted specimens.[56][c]
Jón Brandsson and Sigurður Ísleifsson, the men who had killed the last birds, were interviewed by great auk specialist John Wolley,[59] and Sigurður described the act as follows:
The rocks were covered with blackbirds [guillemots] and there were the Geirfugles … They walked slowly. Jón Brandsson crept up with his arms open. The bird that Jón got went into a corner but [mine] was going to the edge of the cliff. It walked like a man … but moved its feet quickly. [I] caught it close to the edge – a precipice many fathoms deep. Its wings lay close to the sides – not hanging out. I took him by the neck and he flapped his wings. He made no cry. I strangled him.[8]: 82–83
No that’s the one made extinct by feral cats, but that’s a different episode of Tom Scott’s Citation Needed than the one where I learned about the bird I was thinking of. Completely forgot that’s where I’d heard about it!
The bird I had in mind is the Great Auk, which was mentioned in a separate episode of Citation Needed lol
From Wikipedia: "The last pair, found incubating an egg, was killed there on 3 June 1844, on request from a merchant who wanted specimens.[56][c]
Jón Brandsson and Sigurður Ísleifsson, the men who had killed the last birds, were interviewed by great auk specialist John Wolley,[59] and Sigurður described the act as follows:
The rocks were covered with blackbirds [guillemots] and there were the Geirfugles ... They walked slowly. Jón Brandsson crept up with his arms open. The bird that Jón got went into a corner but [mine] was going to the edge of the cliff. It walked like a man ... but moved its feet quickly. [I] caught it close to the edge – a precipice many fathoms deep. Its wings lay close to the sides – not hanging out. I took him by the neck and he flapped his wings. He made no cry. I strangled him.[8]: 82–83
I’m struggling to remember the details, but I recall one account where somebody found a very rare, very endangered bird with its nest, strangled the bird and smashed the eggs within the nest, effectively just for shits and giggles. I’ll edit and update this if I can find the details.
Edit: The Great Auk. Wasn’t killed for shits and giggles, but they were desired for their down to the point the European populations were hunted into extinction. From Wikipedia:
The last pair, found incubating an egg, was killed there on 3 June 1844, on request from a merchant who wanted specimens.[56][c]
Jón Brandsson and Sigurður Ísleifsson, the men who had killed the last birds, were interviewed by great auk specialist John Wolley,[59] and Sigurður described the act as follows:
The rocks were covered with blackbirds [guillemots] and there were the Geirfugles … They walked slowly. Jón Brandsson crept up with his arms open. The bird that Jón got went into a corner but [mine] was going to the edge of the cliff. It walked like a man … but moved its feet quickly. [I] caught it close to the edge – a precipice many fathoms deep. Its wings lay close to the sides – not hanging out. I took him by the neck and he flapped his wings. He made no cry. I strangled him.[8]: 82–83
Was it the Stephens Island Wren?
No that’s the one made extinct by feral cats, but that’s a different episode of Tom Scott’s Citation Needed than the one where I learned about the bird I was thinking of. Completely forgot that’s where I’d heard about it!
The bird I had in mind is the Great Auk, which was mentioned in a separate episode of Citation Needed lol
From Wikipedia: "The last pair, found incubating an egg, was killed there on 3 June 1844, on request from a merchant who wanted specimens.[56][c]
Jón Brandsson and Sigurður Ísleifsson, the men who had killed the last birds, were interviewed by great auk specialist John Wolley,[59] and Sigurður described the act as follows:
Lmao, I knew it was citation needed, just got the wrong bird!