The Carolina parakeet was once the only species of parrot native to the United States, found across a vast expanse of the country from New York in the north to the Gulf of Mexico in the south and the Rocky Mountains in the west. Excessive hunting and trapping meant that the birds had already become rare by the 19th century, but large, isolated flocks were still being recorded until as recently as the early 1900s. Sadly the birds were known for their altruistic habit of flocking to attend to dead or dying members of the same flock—so if only a few birds were felled by hunters, many of the rest of the flock would remain nearby, making themselves easy targets. The last known specimen died in the Cincinnati Zoo in 1918, and the species was finally declared extinct in 1939.