article thumbnail

Cat Wars: The Devastating Consequences of a Cuddly Killer

10,000 Birds

Thus the decision was made to kill 3,600 Barreds, and it’s hard to fault the inescapable logic of doing so, as one Audubon Society director expressed it: On the one hand, killing thousands of owls is completely unacceptable. Other animal control issues that involve mass killing make for easier decisions, according to Peter P.

article thumbnail

Come@Me: Don’t Mourn for Extinct Birds

10,000 Birds

The causes were the usual reasons for island extinction—deforestation by both humans and invasive plants that crowded out native plants, hunting, and invasive rats, mongoose, monkeys, and, of course, feral cats. A foot deep by some accounts, it killed what life was left in the forest. We know what those large flocks were like.

Mauritius 101