Have you ever hated a bird? Pigeons might come to mind, but America's most hated bird is the European Starling and they got their start on the continent in the 1880s. The environmental history of the Starling is a story about hubris and the unintended consequences of human meddling with non-native species. Author Mike Stark joins me to discuss his latest book on the topic.

Essential Reading:

Mike Stark: Starlings: The Curious Odyssey of a Most Hated Bird (2025).

Recommended Reading:

Joel Greenberg, A Feathered River across the Sky: The Passenger Pigeon's Flight to Extinction (2014).

Andrea L. Smalley and Henry M. Reeves, The Market in Birds: Commercial Hunting, Conservation, and the Origins of Wildlife Consumerism, 1850–1920 (2022).

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