page_title: Human uses of birds
section_title: Conservation
hierarchical_section_title: Human uses of birds / Conservation
context_page_description: Human uses of birds have, for thousands of years, included both economic uses such as food, and symbolic uses such as art, music, and religion.
  In terms of economic uses, birds have been hunted for food since Palaeolithic times. They have been captured and bred as poultry to provide meat and eggs since at least the time of ancient Egypt. Some species have been used, too, to help locate or to catch food, as with cormorant fishing and the use of honeyguides. Feathers have long been used for bedding, as well as for quill pens and for fletching arrows.
  Today, many species face habitat loss and other threats caused by humans; bird conservation groups work to protect birds and to influence governments to do so.
  Birds have appeared in the mythologies and religions of many cultures since ancient Sumer. For example, the dove was the symbol of the ancient Mesopotamian goddess Inanna, the Canaanite mother goddess Asherah, and the Greek goddess Aphrodite. Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom, had a little owl as her symbol, and, in ancient India, the peacock represented Mother Earth.
context_section_description: Though human activities have allowed the expansion of a few species, such as the barn swallow and European starling, they have caused population decreases or extinction in many other species. Over a hundred bird species have gone extinct in historical times, including the dodo and the great auk, although the most dramatic human-caused avian extinctions, eradicating an estimated 750–1800 species, occurred during the human colonisation of Melanesian, Polynesian, and Micronesian islands. Many bird populations are declining worldwide, with 1,227 species listed as threatened by BirdLife International and the IUCN in 2009.
  The most commonly cited human threat to birds is habitat loss. Other threats include overhunting; accidental mortality due to collisions with buildings and vehicles; long-line fishing bycatch; pollution (including oil spills and pesticide use), competition; predation; hybridisation from nonnative introduced or invasive species; and climate change. The collection of specimens for taxidermy and eggs from the wild has at times had a serious effect on some species. It is now forbidden in many countries, such as by the British Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.
  Effects are not all negative; for example, wind farms produce renewable energy, helping to mitigate the single greatest threat to birds, climate change. But, especially if wind farms are poorly sited, they may affect bird populations through disturbance, direct or indirect habitat loss, and collisions. Well sited wind farms benefit birds; poorly sited ones can kill many birds in collisions. For example, at the Altamont Pass in California, the golden eagle has been reduced by 80%, and nesting has ceased in the area. Thus, there is a trade-off in the siting of any wind farm.
  Governments and conservation groups work to protect birds, either by passing laws that preserve and restore bird habitat, or by establishing captive populations for reintroductions. Such projects have produced some successes; one study estimated that conservation efforts saved 16 species of bird that would otherwise have gone extinct between 1994 and 2004, including the California condor and Norfolk parakeet. The British Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, founded as the Plumage League in 1889 to protect birds such as the egret from hunting for their plumes, used in fashion, has grown to have over a million members; it has been followed by similar societies in other countries. A more specialised organisation, the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust founded in 1946, works to conserve waterfowl and their wetland habitats, with projects around the world.
caption: The California condor once numbered only 22 birds, but conservation measures have raised that to over 300 today.
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