Passenger Pigeons Taxidermy diorama, 19th century
“Men still live who, in their youth, remember pigeons; trees still live who, in their youth, were shaken by a living wind. But a few decades hence only the oldest oaks will remember, and at long last only the hills will know.” —Aldo Leopold, On a Monument to the Pigeon, 1947 Passenger Pigeons once used to be prolific across North America, with estimates of their population at one point being between 3-5 billion. But frequent hunting caused their extinction and they are now only immortalised in taxidermy; an afterlife that acts as a reminder of the need for preservation and conservation of threatened species. The last passenger pigeon, named Martha, passed away in Cincinnati Zoo on 1st September 1914.