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The last colony of great auks lived on Geirfuglasker (the "Great Auk Rock") off Iceland. This islet was a volcanic rock surrounded by cliffs that made it inaccessible to humans, but in 1830, the islet submerged after a volcanic eruption, and the birds moved to the nearby island of Eldey , which was accessible from a single side.
Mounted great auk, Natural History Museum, London. On Stac an Armin, in July, 1840, the last great auk (Pinguinus impennis) seen in Britain [17] was caught and killed. A then 75-year-old inhabitant of St Kilda told Henry Evans, a frequent visitor to the archipelago, that he and his father-in-law with another man had caught a "garefowl ...
The rough surf around the island usually made it inaccessible to humans, and one of the last refuges for the flightless bird the great auk (which was also called "garefowl" — "geirfugl" in Icelandic). In a volcanic eruption in 1830 this rock submerged. The surviving great auks moved to a nearby island called Eldey and were wiped out by humans ...
The great auk was a large flightless bird that lived in the Northern Hemisphere. It had a large, intricately grooved beak. When the first settlers arrived in Iceland, the auk population was probably in the millions. However, the settlers found the auks to be “very good and nourishing meat.”
' Great Auk Stack '), [2] or Freykja (), [citation needed] is a small, uninhabited island in the Vestmannaeyjar archipelago. [1] [2] Geirfuglasker is located approximately 30 kilometres (19 mi) off Iceland's southwestern coast. [1] [2] The island hosted one of the last known colony of great auks, which thrived given its inaccessibility to humans.
The last known sighting of the species alive was in 1844 when a breeding pair was found and strangled by fishermen, hoping to sell the birds' valuable skins. The great auk is believed to have gone extinct around this time. [23]
Note 3] At 196 metres (643 ft) Stac an Armin is the highest sea stack in the British Isles [10] [11] [12] and in July 1840, the last great auk seen in the British Isles was captured there. [13] East of St Kilda are the Flannan Isles, where all three lighthouse keepers mysteriously vanished without trace in December 1900. [14]
He moved back to London and remained until 1853, studying the great auk. [2] Memorial in Southwell Minster. In 1853 he set off to explore the Arctic region of Lapland, Norway, Sweden and Finland. After returning to England, his health declined with symptoms that included the loss of memory. He died after becoming unconscious on 20 November 1859 ...
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