Two preserved great auk specimens displayed at a museum in 1971. The last pair of great auks were killed in 1844.

The great auk had long provided humans with a source of meat and eggs. But from around 1500, hunting dramatically intensified when Europeans discovered the rich fishing grounds of Newfoundland.

Museums and merchants started paying top dollar for great auk eggs and skins. In 1844, members of a small expedition found two of the birds on an Icelandic island, strangled them and crushed their ...

Hoping to shed new light on the great auk’s extinction, a team of researchers sequenced the complete mitochondrial genomes of 41 birds, using specimens held in museums, reports Gizmodo’s Ryan ...

So when Laughlan McKinnon saw an auk around July 1840, it’s likely he and his two companions had money on their minds. For an unknown reason, however, they made the unusual decision to take the ...

SWANSEA, WALES—Human hunters alone could be responsible for the rapid extinction of the great auk, according to an eLife announcement. Jessica Thomas of Swansea University said millions of the ...

A bronze statue has been unveiled as a memorial to the last Great Auk killed on the Orkney island of Papa Westray. It is an exact copy of the last of the giant seabirds that lived on the island in ...

A bronze statue has been unveiled as a memorial to the last Great Auk killed on the Orkney island of Papa Westray. It is an exact copy of the last of the giant seabirds that lived on the island in ...

A bronze statue has been unveiled as a memorial to the last Great Auk killed on the Orkney island of Papa Westray. It is an exact copy of the last of the giant seabirds that lived on the island in ...