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Even though the majority of commenters are respectful and thoughtful, as a result of the number of trolling comments, repetitive comments, quickly deteriorating civility, and personal attacks, I've again cancelled the 'comment' feature to the blog for now. I tried running the blog in "comment moderation" mode whereby all comments are okayed or rejected ahead of publication with the intent of simply picking out a few of the better comments representing different viewpoints and discarding the rest -- even this however has proved impractical and time-consuming. However, if you feel you have something truly important or new to say you can still email it to me, and if I find it worthwhile enough I can transfer it to the comments section myself or to a post -- if you do send something via email for possible inclusion in the blog, please sign it as you would want it posted (name, "anonymous," or whatever other designation).
With snake and mosquito season rapidly approaching the official Arkansas search will soon end for this season, and unless Cornell has a surprise up their sleeve, there may be only further less-than-convincing, undefinitive sightings and recordings to summarize, which will give skeptics yet a further adrenalin boost. There are however at least 3 obvious explanations proposable:
1) (the skeptics' favorite) the original claims were mistaken IDs, followed by Cornell painting themselves into a corner from which they could not release themselves, and there are NO Ivory-bills in Arkansas.
2) the Ivory-bills in the Big Woods are fewer than we had all hoped for and it will take far more time to document them in such a large area.
3) the few Ivory-bills that were spotted in the Big Woods in 2004 have since departed the area and none are left there currently.
In any event, the search continues in multiple areas that, previous to 2004, were considered far more likely to hold IBWOs than Arkansas, and the Arkansas search itself (whatever this season's results) will commence anew next winter.
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