The Call of the Wild ... Beagle? - February 9, 2010

 

 

We learned last week that there's a population of wild beagles terrorizing Long Island.

Surely that was a typo. Eagles? No, you read that correctly: beagles. According to one story, "they look like Snoopy, but act like werewolves."

Presumably if we were being tormented by a pack of feral beagles -- their long ears flopping menacingly, a ferocious glint in their big, brown eyes -- we'd find them more than a little intimidating. But from the safety of our beagle-free office, it sounds about as sinister as a ravening herd of free-range pugs, or a gaggle of untamed guinea pigs.

Of course, we looked into the peculiarity of formerly domesticated animals breeding in the wild, and it turns out that there are untamed guinea pigs out there. While it might be funny to think of a herd of guinea pigs running around the forest making that bizarre "woop-woop-woop" noise, they do, in fact, wreak havoc. Like any non-native species, they disrupt the ecosystem of their new-found home.

Even more common are breeding populations of exotic birds in decidedly unexotic cities. The parrots of Telegraph Hill in San Francisco gained some fame from the 2005 documentary about them, but they're just one of many metropolitan flocks. Feral parrots congregate in centers of commerce and industry from New York to Chicago to Los Angeles. Even chickens -- yes, feral chickens -- share our municipalities.

Though we scoff at wild populations of chickens roosting under highways off-ramps, some creatures (alligators and Burmese pythons, we're looking at you) really weren't meant for urban lifestyles, so we can't blame them when they end up in our sewers. Untamed humans, please don't release exotic pets into the wild, no matter how cute you think feral hamsters might be.

Suggested Sites...

• Twitter: Invasive Species - Jenn Forman Orth tell you all about the plants and animals that end up where they're not supposed to be.
• California Parrot Project - observing and documenting California's wild parrot populations.
• Brooklyn Parrots - information about Brooklyn's Quaker Parrots, also known as Monk Parakeets.
• Atlas Obscura: The Parrots of Telegraph Hill - where and how to see them.
  
• Simthsonian: Invasion Biology - as usual, humans are to blame.