The remarkable truth about the Dodo,

a juvenile story..

The remarkable truth about the Dodo, a juvenile story..

Now that we are well into the twenty-first century, it’s time to finally lay to rest one of humanity’s oldest and most misleading myths: the Dodo.
I'm really sorry for all those scholars who have built vast theories based on the few real facts about this alleged extinct bird and thus contributed to the unstable house of cards that these stories have become. It had to collapse someday, and now that day has come — just in time, so to speak, because now the chances of mankind getting extinct themselves have been calculated at fifty percent, going the way of the Dodo without a clue about this metaphor.
I'm not a scientist, not even an ornithologist, but perhaps that’s for the best. Isn’t it customary for outsiders to be called in to deliver the bad news? Before I reveal the simple truth I uncovered, let’s lift the veil: The Dodo never existed. This statement should stand on its own in bold capital letters, but I’d like readers to follow me from the beginning — it is after all, a story.

Though I’m not an ornithologist, there’s one key fact about me that might make me uniquely suited to bring this news: I am Dutch! Wasn’t it a group of Dutch sailors who first discovered the bird on Mauritius in the first place? They were certainly not scholars, but even if they had been, they may not have interpreted correctly what they really saw. And what did they see? Here it is, drumroll: the chick of an albatross. More specifically, a juvenile Northern Royal Albatross. This big fat chick was most likely sitting drowsily on its nest, waiting to be fed by its parent albatrosses who were out fishing at sea.

Now, that’s an albatross — an oppressive and inescapable fact! How peculiar, I found this alternative meaning in my online Chambers dictionary.

If you’ve never seen a young albatross grow into one of these giant, mighty birds that rule the seas, you might easily mistake it for a completely unknown species. After hatching, the chick is guarded by one parent for about 40 days, after which it is left largely on its own, receiving only brief visits from the parents to be fed. Over the course of these months, the chick grows larger and fatter. They are fed hastily at night. Chick hatching occurs in late January, and they fledge in late September. If you calculate with me: 40 days of care until the end of February leaves roughly seven months during which the chick (there’s only one at a time; breeding occurs every other year) grows up, mostly unattended.

In the final stage, which happens quickly, the chick becomes an adult on the nest. It sheds its fluffy gray feathers, grows its adult feathers, unfolds its wings, and takes flight, without touching land for an entire year. A truly remarkable phenomenon.

This young bird bears a striking resemblance to the description of the Dodo sightings in the sixteenth century — its overall gray appearance, its sluggishness, the shape of its beak, and even the tuft of feathers on its back. Its behavior of clapping its beak, likely to expel its food, is also striking in the accounts from Mauritius by our Dutch explorers. They observed the birds clapping their beaks in anticipation of being fed. That’s what the original source tells us. Even the confused theories about the "thin" and "fat" Dodos can be easily debunked: the Dutch sailors likely saw older birds during subsequent visits.

The Dutch referred to the bird as "Walghvogel", which translates to "horrible bird" (walgh = horrible to taste,  vogel = bird).  You may be reluctant to test this theory, but doesn't the pudgy flesh of a hatchling usually taste bad?

You may not be convinced at first, but when you look at it this way, everything fits. The Dutch sailors were on brief stops on their way to the East Indies, and thus, they never had the time or interest to study these birds for long periods. Despite their unpleasant taste, they likely ate most of them (typical…). The drawings they made were unprofessional, their stories unscientific, and when the last "Dodos" finally disappeared, the albatrosses never returned, and the myths began. These myths have persisted for over 400 years. Exhibitions and books about the Dodo — lacking factual evidence — are mostly focused on the role the Dodo has played in human imagination over the centuries.

This is how I discovered it: I was watching a documentary on the National Geographic Channel about conservation efforts in New Zealand at Taiaroa Head (Pukekura, as it’s called in Maori) by the WestpacTrust Royal Albatross Centre. At one point in the documentary, a woman was carrying a chick around. Having seen the Dodo illustrations before (the original source is in the archives in The Hague, Holland), I thought, "Hey, they’re carrying a Dodo!" But wait a moment…

Later, I was convinced, I did some research and separated the few known facts about the Mauritius encounter from the enormous amount of nonsense derived from it. I’m sorry, but it’s their own fault for building such huge theories on so little evidence. It’s time to rewrite history.

I contacted the New Zealand center concerning the various bird species. My top candidate turned out to be the Northern variant of the Royal Albatross. When I saw a map showing its habitat, I was sure. It touches on a few tiny specks east of Madagascar — grab another map: Réunion, Rodrigues, and Mauritius!

Now this was some time ago, and I never made the effort to post this story. But after this idea lingered in my mind for a while, I became increasingly irritated whenever a reference to the Dodo was made and even more stories upon stories were being told that made no sense to me. Now here it is — properly posted on the Internet on 11/28/2024.

So, in late September, the chicks in Dunedin, New Zealand, are as alive as a dodo can be. But be warned: visits to the area are strictly controlled because one thing must be avoided at all costs: that the Royal Albatross may one day go extinct, but not like a dodo.

Don’t be a Dodo.

Rowan

Down under, Epoch Unix Timestamp: 1732797237+