Unfortunate Extinctions

Extinction happens when all of an animal or plant species dies out forever. It is actually more common than scientists first thought. There are many causes of extinction but the main ones are changes to habitats through deforestation and agriculture, parasites that can cause death, and hunting. However, sometimes extinction can be caused by much more silly things.

Before humans arrived in New Zealand, there were no natural predators, so there were lots of flightless birds. One species, the Stephen Island Wren, lived happily on a small island until a lighthouse keeper arrived with his pet cat named Mr. Tibbles. The cats’s arrival on the island led to the extinction of the wren in less than a year. It simply had no defence against Mr. Tibbles.

Another bird, the Great Auk, suffered a similarly tragic death. Sailors hunted it for its skin and meat. But the sailors hunted it too much and people thought that it would go extinct. Unfortunately, because people realised this, lots of museums wanted to exhibit the bird. Expeditions went out to kill the last birds so they could be exhibited in museums.

People thought that the Tasmanian Tiger, a small marsupial that lived on an island south of Australia, was a nuisance and they hunted it to near extinction. In an attempt to save the animal, a zookeeper kept one in the hope that more would be found and the animals could reproduce. Unfortunately, the zookeeper accidentally locked the very last Tasmanian Tiger outside its sleeping area and the animal tragically froze to death.