Bird Revival? | God's World News

Bird Revival?

06/20/2018
  • 1 Extinct Birds
    Angelika Nelson shows ivory-billed woodpeckers at the Museum of Biological Diversity, Ohio State University. (AP)
  • 2 Extinct Birds
    Specimens of the extinct passenger pigeon are displayed at the museum in Columbus, Ohio. (AP)
  • 3 Extinct Birds
    The stuffed body of the last passenger pigeon, Martha, is prepared for exhibit at the Smithsonian. (AP)
  • 4 Extinct Birds
    An illustration of the extinct Carolina parakeet, by John James Audubon (AP)
  • 5 Extinct Birds
    At the museum in Ohio a worker holds an an Eskimo curlew specimen. (AP)
  • 1 Extinct Birds
  • 2 Extinct Birds
  • 3 Extinct Birds
  • 4 Extinct Birds
  • 5 Extinct Birds

Studying dead birds may seem grisly. But researchers at Ohio State University’s Museum of Biological Diversity examine lifeless fowl for a living. The museum’s collection includes over 25,000 stuffed, frozen, or otherwise preserved specimens. The hope is that someday, scientists’ post-mortem discoveries could help revive extinct birds.

Researchers know that farming, hunting, development—even fear—have eliminated whole bird species. Dodos, great auks, and laughing owls are all now extinct.

Grant Terrell works at the Ohio museum. He realizes extinction is natural. But he worries that humans “really accelerate” the process. That may be true. But extinction isn’t out of God’s control. In fact, “In His hand is the life of every living thing.” (Job 12:10) That doesn’t let humans off the hook. People should care for animals because of who created them for Himself. (Colossians 1:16-17)

Today, at least two species sampled at Ohio State are extinct—the passenger pigeon and the Carolina parakeet. At one time, the passenger pigeon was the most abundant bird in North America. Its estimated world population was in the billions. An 1855 account describes a flock of passenger pigeons as a “growing cloud.” The cloud took two hours to pass over a city. Passenger pigeons were so terrifyingly abundant that people hunted them right out of existence. Martha, the last known passenger pigeon, died in 1914.

Early Ohio farmers saw Carolina parakeets as seed-eating pests. Settlers cleared trees, the birds’ nesting places. They captured parakeets as pets or used their colorful plumage for hat decorations. Between 1920 and 1930, the birds disappeared completely.

Canadian researchers want to do more than keep current species off the extinct list. They want to develop de-extinction. The method uses DNA to restore lost species. They believe the Carolina parakeet and the passenger pigeon may be candidates for de-extinction.

Sometimes scientists can remove a tiny bit of DNA from a long-dead bird’s shriveled foot. Scientists want to implant DNA from lost species into current species. The result—they hope—would reproduce extinct animals.

Critics say de-extinction won’t work. They insist making animal replicas doesn’t account for genetic uniqueness and complexity—or for health problems of animals born from such experiments. Others say money and efforts are better spent on saving still-living populations.

Grant Terrell calls the bird specimens in the Ohio museum “library books that we can’t reprint.” But thanks to science, someday you may again be able to check out a passenger pigeon in person.