ABSTRACT
Whenever birds have threatened agricultural crops, the natural response of farmers has been to attempt to reduce the depredating populations (Dolbeer 1986). Laws were established as early as 1424 in Europe and 1667 in North America to encourage the killing of rooks (Corvus frugilegus) and blackbirds (Icteridae), respectively, to protect grain crops (Dolbeer 1980; Wright et al. 1980). During the nineteenth century, initial attempts to establish laws in North America protecting overexploited species such as the passenger pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius) were often thwarted by agricultural groups concerned about bird depredations (Schorger 1973). Large-scale efforts to reduce populations of weaver finches, primarily quelea (Quelea quelea), to protect agricultural crops in Africa were attempted from the 1950s through the 1980s, in which hundreds of millions of birds were killed annually with explosives, flamethrowers, and toxicant sprays (Ward 1979; Bruggers and Elliott 1989). In North Africa, millions of European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) were killed in the late 1950s to protect olive groves by the application of the insecticide parathion to winter roosts (Bub 1980).120
