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Carolina Parakeet Not Seen Since 1920
The Cardinal was chosen as North Carolina’s state bird in March 1943. But had fate been kinder, the Carolina Parakeet, North America’s only native parrot, might well have garnered that distinction.
The last captive Carolina Parakeet died in 1918, and the last sure sighting in the wild was in Florida in 1920. But when Europeans first settled North America, teeming flocks snaked through the sky and populated riverbottom forests. The bird’s former range extended from Florida to Virginia, west to Texas and Colorado, and north to Wisconsin. Curiously, within the span of a century, the great flocks dwindled and the tiny parrot vanished. Now, it is almost forgotten.
“The Carolina Parakeet: America's Lost Parrot in Art and Memory” by Carole Boston Weatherford is a cautionary tale of extinction. Combining natural history, culture and sentiment, the book assembles antique illustrations by John James Audubon and others, photos of scientific specimens and the musings of explorers, naturalists, ornithologists and contemporary artists.
The author notes that no single factor led to extinction. Rather, hunting, the hat trade, the pet trade, specimen collecting, honeybee importation and poultry diseases may have compounded the effect of habitat loss, ultimately dooming the species.
Weatherford first saw a Carolina Parakeet specimen at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences and was captivated by the exotic bird. Weatherford has written 21 books, several of which rescue events or subjects from obscurity. She lives in High Point, and teaches at Fayetteville State University. Among her fondest childhood memories are visits with her father to the Victorian-style birdhouse at the Baltimore Zoo.
“The Carolina Parakeet” is available at bookstores everywhere, from online booksellers and the publisher (www.avianpublications.com). The author’s Web site is www.caroleweatherford.com.
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