I love the concept.

I especially like it because when people think of human controlled extermination of species, we tend to only think in the modern world.

We have however, been responsible for many exterminations:

Tasmanian Wolf
Dodo Bird

are two that come to mind.

But in the plant world, as far back as ancient Egypt and the time of Knossos we humans over harvested the plant Silphium to extinction.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silphium

So, I like this idea, I like it a lot.