Cornuropsis carolinensis
"This parrot is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E's expired and gone to meet 'is maker!
'E's a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed 'im to the perch 'e'd be pushing up the daisies!
'Is metabolic processes are now 'istory! 'E's off the twig! 'E's kicked the bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil,
run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible! This is an ex-parrot!"*
"This parrot is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E's expired and gone to meet 'is maker!
'E's a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed 'im to the perch 'e'd be pushing up the daisies!
'Is metabolic processes are now 'istory! 'E's off the twig! 'E's kicked the bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil,
run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible! This is an ex-parrot!"*
I.
Bird lovers the world over were delighted to hear that scientists have managed to sequence the genome of a dead (and, in fact, stuffed) Carolina parakeet; although saddened to have their suspicions confirmed that North America's only native parrot** was driven into the void primarily due to human activity.
For the genetic evidence suggests that populations were buoyant until the arrival and spread of European settlers. The bird's DNA showed no signs, for example, of the inbreeding that is characteristic of species that have been in decline for many generations, across thousands of years.
Only when the White Man arrived in the Americas, did this brightly-coloured bird - with its green plumage and distinctive yellow head that was once found inhabiting forests from New England to Colorado - face extinction. Having abruptly disappeared from the wild, the last known specimen in captivity died in the Cincinnati Zoo, in February 1918.
Quite what happened to the bird, no one knows for sure - though we can be fairly certain that deforestation and hunting played significant roles in its demise. Like other parrots, they liked to congregate in large, noisy flocks which made their slaughter by men with guns easy to accomplish (like shooting fish in a barrel).
II.
You might think that this, then, would be the end of the story ... That having become extinct, the Carolina parakeet, is no more: that he has ceased to be; gone to meet his maker and joined the bleedin' choir invisible, etc. But you'd be mistaken ...
For like the passenger pigeon, the heather hen, and the dodo, the Carolina parakeet is a candidate for de-extinction or bio-resurrection; i.e., the process of bringing an extinct organism back from the dead, via cloning, genome editing, or selective breeding.
Of course, this has never been done before and presents enormous technical challenges. But just because something is incredibly difficult to do, doesn't make it impossible ...
As well as birds, scienists working in this area are also hoping to bring back a species of giant tortoise, a ground-dwelling frog native to Australia, and a whole list of mammals including the European cave lion, a prehistoric wolf, and - of course - the woolly mammoth.
I have to say, I find all this very exciting to consider in a way that conservation projects, sadly, never are. It's always disconcerting, however, to discover that here - as elsewhere - the Nazis led the way, producing a breed of aggressive supercows in the 1930s, based on a species of extinct wild bull that once roamed the forests of Europe.***
Still, never mind the aurochs - bring back the dead parrots!
Notes
* The lines quoted (pretty much from ingrained cultural memory) are from the 'Dead Parrot Sketch', written by John Cleese and Graham Chapman, and performed by Cleese and Michael Palin in S1/E8 of Monty Python's Flying Circus (7 December 1969). Click here for the version of the sketch featured in the Python film And Now for Something Completely Different (1971).
** It's true that the thick-billed parrot once lived in the American Southwest, but I think of this more as a Mexican bird that had extended its range northwards, rather than as a true native of the United States.
***The cows, bred from wild genes extracted from domestic descendants of the aurochs, were produced by German zoologists Heinz and Lutz Heck, whom the Nazis commissioned to produce a type of Aryan cattle with muscular physiques, deadly horns, and a fighting temperament. How far they succeeded in this is debatable (criticism can certainly be made of their methodology and, physically, the Heck cattle bear little resemblance to aurochs, being shorter and fatter, for example).
** It's true that the thick-billed parrot once lived in the American Southwest, but I think of this more as a Mexican bird that had extended its range northwards, rather than as a true native of the United States.
***The cows, bred from wild genes extracted from domestic descendants of the aurochs, were produced by German zoologists Heinz and Lutz Heck, whom the Nazis commissioned to produce a type of Aryan cattle with muscular physiques, deadly horns, and a fighting temperament. How far they succeeded in this is debatable (criticism can certainly be made of their methodology and, physically, the Heck cattle bear little resemblance to aurochs, being shorter and fatter, for example).
