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Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

C

Coleman

Well-known member
A few weeks ago i read this entry in wikipedia.

In the early 1800s, commercial hunters began netting and shooting the birds to sell in the city markets as food, as live targets for trap shooting and even as agricultural fertilizer and mast food. The bird painter John James Audubon described the rigorous slaughter: "Few Pigeons were then to be seen, but a great number of persons, with horses and wagons, guns and ammunition, had already established encampments on the borders. Two farmers from the vicinity of Russelsville, distant more than a hundred miles, had driven upwards of three hundred hogs to be fattened on the pigeons which were to be slaughtered. Here and there, the people employed in plucking and salting what had already been procured, were seen sitting in the midst of large piles of these birds. The dung lay several inches deep, covering the whole extent of the roosting-place."
Click to expand...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passenger_Pigeon#Life_and_extinction

Is it possible, that the virus shift of H1N1 happend through such practices in the decades before "Spanish flu"??
 
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Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

I know these sites ...
But - there is nothing to read about my hypothesis ...
 
Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

..and that's why I consider it unlikely.
Any die off due to viruses should have been noticed and reported.
Such an event like the extinction of a huge species usually
triggers speculations - no signs of disease here.
While other non-virus explanations sound reasonable.
 
Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

I know that the mass slaughter and the deforestation (destroying of the habitat) were the causes of the extinction, as further reason ND is mentioned in some reports.

I didn't targeted directly to the extinction with my question, but to the practices to mast pigs with culled birds - and that in vast quantities.
IMO thats a dangerous practice which could lead to an virus shift, assuming that the passenger pigeons were carrier of H1N1. At least they were carrier of Newcastle Disease according to some reports. But to my information ND was introduced to Newcastle from China in 1927, so i don't know how valid this information can be considered.
The problem is, that to that time it wasn't very much known about virus diseases. E. g. in this paper they didn't know anything about viruses in 1918.
http://www.oznet.ksu.edu/historicpublications/Pubs/SC070.PDF

In 1889 e.g. Prof. Nothnagel claimed that the disease influenza is a bacteriological disease!
The first isolation of influenza viruses happend in 1933.
The first isolated influenza virus in germany was found in 1934.

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influenza
 
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Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

In the meanwhile we know that the highly pathogenic AI-virus H5N1 has emerged from viruses of a goose and two quails - detailed information, if required are here ...
http://www.jncc.gov.uk/PDF/pub07_waterbirds_part4.2.4.pdf

But are there any genetic investigations which species could have been involved in the evolution of the highly pathogenic H1N1 (Spanish flu) virus? Which birds?
IMO, it must have been birds, which had contact to mass production of pigs (i.e. as mast food, comparable with the integrated fishfarming systems, which are in charge for the development of HP AI H5N1). I can't imagine, that this virus has emerged only in pigs. Thats absurd.
 
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Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

Interesting speculation, coleman!
The event described occurred approx 100 yrs before the Spanish Flu, so a direct connection is unlikely. But any significant interaction between populations of one species seems to provide oppportunities for reassortment and recombination. Significant interactions between species seems like a possible node where a virus can jump species.
There's all different kinds of melting pots.
 
Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

100 years?

There was a slow decline in their numbers between about 1800 and 1870, followed by a catastrophic decline between 1870 and 1890,[5] at the end of which they were rare and beyond the point of recovery.
Click to expand...

I think 30 years are still enough for a reassortment in the masted pig populations.
 
Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

As avian influenza has probably been in evolution for millions of years, it is to suppose that an extensive equilibrium has been established as to host range and host interaction.

The problem comes up when frequent opportunity to host change is linked with high population densities. This has been mainly effected in context with human intervention.

An exact tracing of the viral evolutionary pathways is only possible on a genetic basis. Taubenberger interpretes the 1918 sequences as purely avian but - as pre 1918 avian HA's dont't match with the 1918 HA -puts into doubt a direct bird/human - transmission. A - hypothetic -mammalian intermediate host should have left traces - espacially if you suppose an evolution over 100 years.

For details see: Taubeberger: Origin and evolution of the 1918 ??Spanish?? influenza virus
and
1917 avian influenza virus sequences suggest that the 1918 pandemic virus did not acquire its hemagglutinin directly from birds.
 
Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

it would be interesting to see, which flu-viruses caused
the epidemics and seasonal outbreaks before 1918,
and which apparantly was completely wiped out.

Was it also "avian" ? Does this outwiping occur regularly , and why ?

That would mean, that influenza just evolves in birds
with small temporary intervals of human evolution -
but the human viruses only survive some
decades or centuries before they get replaced by avian ones
or by new reassortments.

But you can follow back the serotypes and the evolution rate,
and it was suggested that the serotypes have common ancestors
just only some thousands of years ago.

Another paper suggested that the amount of possible serotypes
or genotypes is rather limited and that they reoccur.
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/0702154104v1

We had a thread, whether H5N1 existed before 1900 here
some months ago (I can't refind it now)
 
Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

For an interesting discussion on the different possible origins of 1918 H1N1, see http://ec.europa.eu/research/biotechnology/ec-us/docs/workshop04/dr_ann_reid_en.pdf

Contributors include J. Taubenberger.

Conclusion​

? Data is not consistent with any of the conventional
theories of where pandemic influenza strains
originate
? Most likely explanation is a currently unknown
reservoir of influenza virus, similar to wild
waterfowl strains at amino acid level, but
evolutionarily separate long enough to acquire
many synonymous changes​
Click to expand...
.
 
Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

someone should examine the pre-1918 outbreak-data.
It could be possible to detect whether there were two different
serotypes cirulating at that time. Or whether there are patterns
in how the seasonal waves spread , depending on the virus.
 
Re: Connection between extinction of passenger pigeon and Spanish flu?

Again - I don't assume of 100 years ... the peak of mass culling was between 1870 and 1890. Maybe it's improbable, that a highly pathogenic virus need 30 years, maybe not. But finally it would be interesting which species were the carrier for spanish flu. Which pervers practices like masting pigs with wild birds are used to that time as well?
 
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