When Governments Meddle With Nature

CHINA

Chairman Mao Zedong’s 1958 campaign to eliminate “four pests,” including sparrows, disastrously tipped the ecological balance. Predator-free locusts destroyed crops, exacerbating a national famine that killed millions.

AUSTRALIA

Bounties offered by the government of Tasmania for the Tasmanian tiger played a part in causing the eventual extinction of this apex predator in 1936. The marsupial had been considered a pest in the Australian island-state.

U.S.

A 20th century federal extermination program nearly killed all gray wolves in the U.S. Their 1995 reintroduction to Yellowstone National Park stopped elk from overgrazing and increased biodiversity.