was reading about the passenger pigeon extinction recently, this might be the most horrifying extract on all of wikipedia:
One method of capture was to hunt at a nesting colony, particularly during the period of a few days after the adult pigeons abandoned their nestlings but before the nestlings could fly.[64] Some hunters used sticks to poke the nestlings out of the nest, while others shot the bottom of a nest with a blunt arrow to dislodge the pigeon.[64] Others cut down a nesting tree in such a way that when it fell, it would also hit a second nesting tree and dislodge the pigeons within.[64] Still another way was to simply set a nesting tree on fire, cooking the doves or collecting them as they tried to escape.[65][66] An extreme method, practiced only by particularly unscrupulous hunters, was to set fire to the base of a tree nested with pigeons, whereby the adults would free and the juveniles would fall to the ground, bursting open.[3]There were a wide variety of other methods that were used to capture and kill passenger pigeons. Sulfur was sometimes burned beneath the nesting tree to suffocate the birds, which fell out of the tree in a weakened state.[67] At least one trapper used alcohol-soaked grain as bait to intoxicate the birds and make them easier to kill.[68] Salt was also frequently used as bait, and many trappers set up near salt springs.[69] Stool pigeons, which traditionally were blinded, were also used to attract flocks of pigeons that thought that the stool pigeon had found food.[70]
Low-flying pigeons could be killed by thrown sticks or stones.[68] At one site in Oklahoma, the pigeons leaving their roost every morning flew low enough that the Cherokee could throw clubs into their midst, which caused the lead pigeons to try to turn aside and in the process created a blockade that created a large mass of flying, easily hit pigeons.[68]
Basket used to transport captured passenger pigeons
Nets were propped up to allow passenger pigeons entry, then closed by knocking loose the stick that supported the opening, trapping twenty or more pigeons inside.[71] Tunnel nets were also used to great effect, and one particularly large net was capable of catching 3,500 pigeons at a time.[72] These nets were used by many farmers on their own property as well as by professional trappers.[73]
Passenger pigeons were shot with such ease that many did not consider them to be a game bird, as an amateur hunter could easily bring down six with one shotgun blast; a particularly good shot with both barrels of a shotgun at a roost could kill 61 birds.[74][75] They were frequently shot either in flight during migration or immediately after, when they traditionally perched in dead, exposed trees.[74] The pigeons did prove difficult to shoot head-on, so hunters typically waited for the flocks to pass overhead before shooting them.[76] Trenches were sometimes dug and filled with grain so that a hunter could shoot the pigeons along this trench.[76]
fwiw i still inwardly apologise to woodpigeons, for those bursting to dub me Hypocrite
― u have wiked together fiords (imago), Sunday, 29 March 2015 19:28 (nine years ago) link
The vultures (Cathartes urubu, Coragyps atratus foetens) fell upon him, devoured first of all the lizards, and then attacked the body of the unfortunate youth, beginning with his buttocks. Pain restored him to consciousness, and the hero drove off his attackers which, however, had completely gnawed away his hindquarters. Having eaten their fill, the birds were prepared to save his life; taking hold of his belt and the strips of cotton round his arms and legs with their beaks, they lifted him into the air and deposited him gently at the foot of the mountain.
The hero regained consciousness “as if he were awaking from a dream.” He was hungry and ate wild fruits but noticed that since he had no rectum, he was unable to retain the food, which passed through his body without even being digested. The youth was at first nonplussed and then remembered a tale told him by his grandmother, in which the hero solved the same problem by molding for himself an artificial behind out of dough made from pounded tubers.
http://radicalanthropologygroup.org/sites/default/files/pdf/class_text_056.pdf
― drash, Sunday, 29 March 2015 20:17 (nine years ago) link
three weeks pass...
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― italosVEVO (wins), Thursday, 7 May 2015 21:37 (nine years ago) link