-- From Louisiana --

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Received a letter yesterday from Louisiana searchers with information they wish to pass along for the benefit of any other active searchers. The verbatim letter below:

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"We have just returned from several areas in LA and MS where we observed drought habitat conditions.  This has triggered a good oak mast crop.  We recently received, credible, repeat site reports from LA in an oak dominated ridge in a residential area, and after visiting believe that Ivory-bills could be disproportionately in oak dominated, higher areas near the first bottoms or second bottoms during the upcoming seasons.

Fred Virrazzi, Franklin Wiley and myself, a botanist, were camping in the tupelo-cypress dominated first bottoms when we recorded no insects under several square feet of bark peeled from dead boles of multiple species.  Internally to six inches, the standing dead wood was also dry.

We were skeptical of any sightings in a residential area but upon videoed interviews, review of field notes and ecological observations we surmised these were likely good sightings in a wooded residential area surrounded on three sides by first bottoms.  Most importantly the 300 acre area was a ridge, perpendicular to a large river with tens of thousands of acres of decent bottomland and this higher strip had many Live Oaks and other species producing mast.  The observer was very reputable; the bird flew away upon detection of slight movement the two times it was observed perched.

Fred noted that mast attracted Ivory-bills to Wadmacon Island, SC in the 1930’s and that  historical literature describes it as an Ivory-billed food resource.  In modern times Guthrie and Everett noted a possible connection between mast and Ivory-bills. 

In drought years borer insects can be harder to find and acorn crops can be heavy; it could be a time to look for birds in higher, wooded areas near the bottomlands.

Thank You,

Elizabeth Peck
National Biodiversity Parks"

*********************************

 I have inquired of them 1) if there's any chance the "videoed interviews" would be publicly available at some point (or, alternatively, if anyone from Cornell, LSU, or USFWS have viewed them), and 2) if they're able to be any more specific about the LA. location they are referring to, but have not yet heard back. Perhaps they can respond here in the comments at some point...?
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-- Rarer Than Ivory-bills??? --

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Recently someone sent me a photo of a partially "leucistic" Pileated Woodpecker, in this instance a specimen with a slightly enlarged white wing patch showing. Over the years from time-to-time readers have sent along such pics of Pileateds with various small white body patches present, though I've never found such examples very interesting. What does interest me though (as I've repeatedly noted before) are Pileateds with a great prevalence of white showing on their bodies. There have been several of these discovered over the years in different locales (including the Big Woods of Arkansas). A Google image search brings up some of them:

http://tinyurl.com/aul2uhv

Always worth keeping such examples in mind, not because they would likely be mistaken for Ivory-bills, but because they hint at the possibility of specimens that truly do have a large, more defined, white (symmetrical) shield-like pattern that might mimic an Ivory-bill. I'm still waiting for the day when someone gets a photo of such a bird (as Noel Snyder actually reported seeing decades ago in Florida, but didn't get a photograph). I suspect such birds truly do exist and possibly even get mistaken for IBWOs… but, I also suspect, for now, that they are rarer than Ivory-bills.
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-- FWIW --

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David Luneau notes (Oct. 18) receipt of a recent sighting he seems to feel of some interest. No details provided as yet, however; not even as to general location:

http://www.ibwo.org/index.php

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-- "Potential Source of Confusion" --

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I'll pass along this note from a reader expressing "a potential source of confusion" that searchers ought be alerted to… the Black-bellied Whistling Duck.

This species is expanding it's territory further into Southeastern states, and the e-mailer notes that in the case of a brief glance from behind, the bird would flash black-and-white wings, have duck-like flight, be the right size, found in a swamp, and possibly taking off from a tree; moreover a typical field guide range map wouldn't necessarily lead one to consider this species.
The writer sends along the below photo (of a BBWD) to give some sense of what a sudden escape flight might appear like:

...For obvious reasons, 'fleeting glances' of birds flying away are not likely at this point, to get much serious consideration as Ivory-bills from the birding community; and better, longer looks are likely to rule out BBWD and other waterfowl... but good to keep all possibilities in mind.
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-- Long Hot Summer --

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Have only heard from a couple of folks who spent any time looking for IBWOs during what may have been the worst, hottest, buggiest, most uncomfortable summer on recent record in the Southeast (never a great time to look for IBWOs, even under good conditions). If anyone further cares to note the location of any search time spent in the last few months feel free to  (for example I presume at least some searching continues in the Big Woods, yet I don't recall anyone mentioning it to me via email for quite awhile. Also, if anyone still has automatic remote cameras up & running, or plans to re-deploy in winter, I'd be curious to know that as well, just to have a better sense of what locales continue to receive some monitoring).

December-March is probably the far more propitious time for searching... we'll see how many man-hours and reports, if any, the upcoming winter produces. Mike Collins notes that he hopes to have a very active search season in his Pearl River domain, probably beginning around January, but also says this may be his last season, with tentative plans to return to his Wash. D.C. work office in 2013: http://www.fishcrow.com/winter13.html
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-- Jurassic Whatever… --

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I s'pose I have some ambivalent feelings about this, but iconoclast Stewart Brand (with others) has a current project underway, called "Revive and Restore" to bring back-to-life various extinct species, using modern genetic techniques. Although their current focus is on the Passenger Pigeon, both the Ivory-billed and Imperial Woodpeckers are among other candidate species being considered.

http://rare.longnow.org/projects.html

http://blog.longnow.org/02012/07/16/revive-and-restore/

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-- Replay --

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For any who may be interested, someone named John Deamond has pieced together this video of various IBWO-related clips (there seems to be no accompanying audio). The first minute-or-so are some very quick clips, mostly zoomed, that have made claims of showing IBWOs (some from YouTube, some from Mike Collins, 1 from Geoff Hill's group). The next 11 minutes are various replayings of the Luneau clip from Arkansas, and the last minute is some superfluous animation:

IBWO Triptych from john deamond on Vimeo.

I don't find anything distinctly helpful or new here, but pass it along in the event others may wish to play with it. Also, don't know any particulars about John's project beyond his own statement that it is "...about extinct birds and how the events surrounding and following their demise reflect issues with how we deal with the natural environment."

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-- Hope (...and Reports) Remains --

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Minnesota birder Jim Williams voices his continued hope for the Ivory-bill in this current short column:

http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/homegarden/blogs/162911316.html

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-- Random Thoughts on a Hot Summer Night --

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Often I let such things go, though sometimes they wear on me a bit… mislabeled pictures of an "Ivory-billed Woodpecker" (with a photo of a Pileated) continually appear on the Web, simply adding to the widespread confusion that stiiiiill exists over these 2 species even after all this time. 

(Ivory-billed Woodpecker... NNNOT!!)

Mislabeled pics on the Web are especially egregious because of the way they are picked up by others and transferred along, so even if the originating site eventually corrects their depiction, the inaccurate picture may have already traveled on, unchecked, repeatedly far and wide. 
Likewise, I've lost track of how many videos on YouTube have appeared claiming "Ivory-billed Woodpecker" for a bird that is clearly something other (and there are other Web video sites that I don't track closely enough to even know how often the same mistake occurs elsewhere).
 It's even more disconcerting that many of these claims emanate from poor habitat or simply inappropriate states (New York, Washington state, Arizona…). Although, most of these cases are probably sincere mistakes, it's also clear that some are instances of prankish individuals wishing only to mess with other people's minds. Getting a good, clear sighting, let alone photo of an Ivory-bill, in good habitat remains a daunting task.

Even National Geographic (a site many would presume credible) for years carried a lead photo of a Pileated Woodpecker above a 2006 Web article on the IBWO search, entitled "The Ghost Bird"… a photo that got picked up and used by others referencing it as an "Ivory-billed Woodpecker." Is it any wonder that IBWOs continue to get ID'd mistakenly in the field by novices and ill-informed individuals, sometimes literally relying on an incorrect picture seen on the Web… or, is it any wonder that others now pretty much automatically dismiss any and all such claims… still, each and every claim and picture coming forth must be looked at individually and adjudged on its own merits… not judged or generalized about on the basis of all that has preceded it.

Science is not (nor ever has been) the pristine activity some uncritically view it as. In recent months many 'scandals' (of varying seriousness) in scientific publications have emerged. One of the most widely followed has been the so-called "arseniclife" or "arsenicgate" story in which a NASA-based study claimed the discovery of a bacterial life-form employing arsenic in the place of phosphorous in its DNA (a monumental biology finding). One likes to imagine that NASA pretty well knows what it's doing scientifically, but following the much-ballyhooed announcement a near immediate firestorm of Internet-generated criticism began throwing cold water on the claims. For now, the original authors continue to defend their results, even while refutations have been published and few seem to take the initial claimants very seriously. 
It is reminiscent of the 1989 Fleischmann/Pons report of creating tabletop cold fusion in the lab, which was likewise quickly shot down by the majority of the scientific community. Mistakes (...or merde ;-)) happen. There have been many instances of fraud in science in recent times; these last two examples aren't instances of that… just mistakes, over-anxiousness, and possibly poor or sloppy science.
 
In some quarters I still see the original Cornell/Nature Conservancy pronouncement of Ivory-billed Woodpeckers in the Big Woods characterized as a "hoax" or "fraud." It is clearly a MIS-characterization (for what, at worst, was weak science), but again, once on the Web it will carry well into the future, to many future newbie students… IF, the IBWO is never confirmed.
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-- Higgs Appears, Bevier Disappears --

(The elusive Higgs Bird, from Chester Reed 

via Wikimedia Commons)

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Happy Holiday! to my US readers… and Happy Higgs Day! to my European readers (and science buffs EVERYwhere!)… now that 'The God Particle' is being confirmed, perhaps the Lord God Bird will follow… ;-)

anyway, just one actual IBWO note of curiosity today:

I recently clicked to Louis Bevier's honed (skeptical) site on the Ivory-bill debate, only to find it gone:

http://web.mac.com/lrbevier/ivorybilled/Overview.html

Having not visited for several months, not sure when it went down, but apparently Apple dropped that particular domain from use at some point. So I surmise that either…

1) Louis, purposely or accidentally, let the site disappear, since he has the hard data and may feel the debate is long-settled, so no need to continue the Website... (or he may be re-working the material to re-post the site).

2) or, if by chance he is planning to publish further, extended material on the matter (in an academic journal), he may have felt no need to keep the Website up-and-running with a more formal publication in the offing.

3) or, he may simply be tired of being associated with the entire IBWO topic at all and moved on.

There are other possible explanations as well I s'pose, so if anyone knows more, or if his site can be found at some new URL, please let us know.
You can, by the way, still find most of the text portions of Bevier's old site via the Internet's Wayback Machine here:

http://tinyurl.com/6omqdkf
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-- Book Review --

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I previously promoted Canadian Tom Gallant's recent novel, "The Lord God Bird," before actually seeing it, and now with so little other news to report, and having read it, I may as well do my own review….

First, one should know that I can count on the fingers of one hand (and not including the thumb!) the number of novels I've read in the last 20 years, so I ain't the finest judge of fiction (in fact I tend to be hyper-critical of it)! It takes a work like Gallant's to even grab my (prejudiced) attention much, and spend $$$ on a novel.

With that said, I recommend this quaint and odd little book to all Ivory-bill aficionados in particular, and nature readers more generally… I want to say that upfront, because I don't want the criticisms ahead to be taken too weightily.

Gallant's writing is about as terse and abrupt as any I've encountered, and yet still descriptive. The nameless main characters are (possibly paradoxically) both sparsely, yet richly, drawn out. The writing is almost too spare and pithy for my taste, but in a short volume, it nonetheless works well, and will please most readers. The overriding effect is that of deep 'truths'/insights being continuously but nonchalantly proffered to the reader from the main protagonist.

The story is surprisingly close in general pattern to actual events of the last several years: a local Arkansas outdoorsman (who remains nameless throughout) spots an Ivory-billed Woodpecker in the Big Woods of Arkansas, and the news soon travels to the ivory-towered world of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Two representatives from there visit the area and quickly also spot the bird, bringing in even more academic types and volunteers for a more thorough search of the area… sound familiar? 
Obviously, the book is based on the real events that this blog has followed so closely for the last 6 years, yet its unfolding story is told in a completely fictionalized form, so while the pattern sounds familiar, the details differ greatly. I find it a bit odd that Gallant chose to stay as close to an actual sequence of events as he did (when he had an immense world of fictional possibilities to draw from)… but having done that, I find it odd that he didn't choose even more of the events from the last 6 years that were available to weave into the story. There have been so many elements of the Ivory-bill saga that could be fictionalized into interesting twists and mysteries and storylines… I think he missed a lot of potential opportunities here; but this book is more a succinct and heartfelt telling, than a highly-involved weaving.

For me, the novel takes off with chapter 3, when the Ivory-billed Woodpecker itself comes on stage as an anthropomorphically-thinking/'speaking' character. The anthropomorphized Ivory-bills are something you will either read and find off-putting… or, read and tear up at. For most readers of this blog I hope it is the latter. For me it is a centerpiece of the volume; a sort of flight-of-fancy element that lets the story carve out a special niche, as we surreptitiously gain access to the thoughts/'feelings' of the iconic species. In fact, I would've liked to have seen a lot more of it in the pages.

In chapter 8, "Ron" and "Steve" from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology enter the scenario, and as so often happens in fiction, begin playing the role of 'outsider' academics cast into the real world of the main character who is wary of them. I won't go much into the details of the storyline, nor the ending, so as not to spoil it for any readers. Much of the narrative is about the relationships that develop between the main character and the varied others who enter his world following his sighting. The main character's outlook and 'philosophy' of sorts is also an ongoing thread throughout these pages. And there are of course many interludes, focused on the action of the Ivory-bill 'characters' as well, as they succeed and fail and succeed again at raising young, while warily watching the human invasion of their premises. The story moves along at an easy-flowing pace; sometimes a bit predictable, but not too predictable. And the ending pleases.

On the critical side I felt the volume suffered from some choppiness, some under-development, and possibly some factual glitches, but overall was a wonderful effort for a first-time novel (Gallant has previously written non-fiction). It is a somewhat lyrical ode to nature, though possibly not quite as lyrical as I was expecting or hoping for. At times, for me, the volume alternated between being a simple pleasant human story and being a loftier work, on the verge of soaring... but never sustained its loftiness long enough. The ending is poignant and a tad haunting, but could've been even more powerful (that's just my take, as someone inordinately wrapped-up in this species, and who may have held unrealistically high expectations that the book couldn't attain). One of the advance blurbs on the book's back cover calls it a "sweet uplifting parable for our times." I think that's as good a 6-word summation as I could offer.

Four times in the last 20 years I have myself started writing (and failed to finish), an Ivory-billed Woodpecker book: 3 of those efforts were non-fiction (each with a quite different approach), but one was a novel.  The novel I envisioned carried a different plot than Tom's book, but a somewhat similar tone, 'feel' or 'mystique' to what Gallant has created here. His is a crisper, probably simpler, story than I had in mind, and I'm thrilled he told it. So despite the mild criticisms, I do heartily recommend it to all who are enamored of this iconic bird, or simply in search of an enjoyable nature story. I'm glad someone took the time to write it (and, in the process, to exhibit so much respect for the subject)… the Ivory-bill deserves no less.


Another recent piece on Tom's book here:

http://southshorenow.ca/archives/2012/062712/arts/Tom_Gallant_releases_first_fictional_novel.html.php

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-- Go On Record... --

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With so little to report, I'll just mention that Jack Hitt's latest book, "Bunch of Amateurs," includes a long chapter on the whole Ivory-bill escapade since Cornell's original announcement (and the role of "amateurs" in that escapade). I've previously linked to this NY Times article of Hitt's which includes some of the same info he used in his book:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/07/magazine/07woodpecker.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

(not sure if everyone can directly open the link or if you'll need a free registration with the Times to access it)

Since I expect ensuing months to be slow for IBWO news I'll put out a call as I did once before:

...If anyone who has been involved at some level with the IBWO story over the last several years is willing to submit to an interview as I've done in the past (answering transcribed questions, not an audio or podcast), let me know. This could be anyone who thinks they have a viewpoint or information worth sharing, either from the 'believer' or skeptical side, positive or negative…. Assuming I know of you in some guise just email me (cyberthrush@gmail.com) with a note indicating a willingness to be interviewed. If by chance I might not know of your role in the whole IBWO endeavor then please explain in the email your background and what you feel you may have to offer (so I can figure out what sorts of questions to pose for you). Don't everyone volunteer at once!….
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-- Sharin' Some Ivory-bill Love --

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Sometimes I skip over reporting on non-documentary Ivorybill-related movies, novels, stories, and the like here… enough folks already regard the content of this blog as fiction ;-) without me bringing up deliberate outputs of fiction. But the reviews I've seen for a recent novel set in the Big Woods of Arkansas, entitled "The Lord God Bird" by Tom Gallant, are too good and positive, not to pass this one along (haven't read it myself, but haven't seen a single bad review).

From the publisher:

"Infused with captivating imagery and spare, assertive prose, The Lord God Bird explores the vibrant spirit of a wild creature in a way no nonfiction work ever could. This is a profound, yet hopeful, meditation on the way humans relate to the natural world."

Read more about it here:

http://thechronicleherald.ca/books/93291-connection-to-the-wilderness

http://www.quantucklanepress.com/catalog/book.php?bkID=102

http://www.kingmandailyminer.com/main.asp?SectionID=74&SubSectionID=649&ArticleID=50206

http://tomgallant.com/site/the-lord-god-bird/the-lord-god-blurbs/

...a transcribed interview with the author here:

http://tomgallant.com/site/the-lord-god-bird/q-a-with-tom-gallant/

and an audio interview here:

http://tinyurl.com/734b82j

…may it be a moving, inspiring read for visitors here.

ADDENDUM 6/17: Rick Wright has now written a nice review of Gallant's book over at the ABA Blog:

http://blog.aba.org/2012/06/gallant-the-lord-god-bird.html
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-- Florida Dreaming --

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 May closes out soon and with it, summer overtakes the southeast… summer heat, humidity, foliage, bugs, snakes…. If any Ivory-bills fledged this spring they may just now be beginning to travel around the forest greenery with their parents, just as Ivory-bill searching is largely forced to wind down to a standstill.

Not too much new to report (a few re-hash articles have been on the Web), so I'll just toss out the little bit of visual entertainment I can find: 

First this nice-sounding double-knock apparently recorded in the Choctawhatchee (around the 5-6 second point; & turn your volume up):

 

the fellows recording it made a pleasant companion travelogue of their venture (no additional IBWO material though):

 

From the serious (I assume/hope) to the oddball… an individual on Facebook casually claims the recent sighting of 2 Ivory-bills on a tree somewhere in central Florida (outside Gainesville, I believe, but not certain), and got at least one blurry photo:

http://tinyurl.com/ctvxwfv

The bird certainly has an interesting posture, size, and neck(!), and is on an interesting tree (though poor-looking habitat), but lacks key features of an IBWO (longer bill, white saddleback) and so it goes....

Here's an artist's rendering of an IBWO in a similar pose:

http://cache.io9.com/assets/images/8/2011/05/ivory-billed-woodpecker.jpg

and here, some Pileateds similarly posing:

http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a169/libsys/Jan2009/IMG_1804aPileatedWoodpecker.jpg

 http://www.outdooralabama.com/images/Image/Pileated.jpg

http://tinyurl.com/7om963v

http://tinyurl.com/7r45wk7

Summer seems to always bring a few more interesting tidbits than I expect, but still am not anticipating a great deal of posting over next few months. We'll see what happens....

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-- Population Genetics & Species Decline --

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h/t to Nate Swick and the ABA Blog for bringing attention to some graduate student work at LSU focusing on using new population genetics techniques to better account for the significant declines/extinction of some iconic bird species:



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-- Comedy of Errors? --

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..... Seven years ago today, Cornell Lab of Ornithology officials made what may have been either the most incredible, or, ultimately most embarrassing, announcement in the entire history of American ornithology. Some of us are still awaiting a verdict on that announcement… (while others have long-past made up their minds). And seven years later, no final compendium of the official search, as promised, has been forthcoming; in fact the principals largely steer clear of public Ivory-bill discussion now -- what was once a great fund-raising tool would now virtually be a fund-raising obstruction. 
But the topic continues....

Many (unfortunately) will view last week's mini-fiasco at a local Texas TV station (implying first a Red-headed Woodpecker and then later a Pileated Woodpecker were putative Ivory-bills based on one local observer) as the mere continuation of a (perceived) comedy of errors begun 7 years ago.

Every few months I still get via email a claimed Ivory-bill sighting from somewhere… and I suspect others in the ornithology community hear a lot more stories than I do. Claims for Ivory-bills continue to show up on websites, including Twitter and Facebook. And YouTube receives several "Ivory-bill" videos each year. In short, even after all this time and publicity, claims from the inexpert and inexperienced roll in… and I don't blame people (too much?) for getting excited and jumping to false conclusions based on limited knowledge. …It is odd though when out-of-the-blue, one of these multitudinous claims makes it directly onto a TV station. So, I do blame a knucklehead ;-) news station when they take such a story and run with it to a mass audience without the simplest of verification (the Texas story was no doubt used, because it included video… but THAT of course is exactly why it could've so easily been researched and junked!). 

I won't recount the full story here; it's already received more publicity than it ever deserved. One suspects the primary station involved was deluged with a range of polite to riled corrections from a throng of birders/biologists… but I also suspect they simply found it humorous that, in a day of Jihadi terrorists, global warming, and economic plight, folks would so bristle over a mere botched animal/human-interest story. Bristle they (rightfully) did...

Because of the nature of the Internet, and despite a later correction from the broadcast station, the bogus story will continue to bounce around the Web in some quarters for days or weeks, reinforcing the 'laughability' quotient of the whole Ivory-bill topic.
A Texas trademark slogan warns us, "Don't mess with Texas"… I'd prefer to revise that to, "HEYYY, Texas, DON'T MESS with birders… puhhh-leeeze!!!" 
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-- On the Big Screen --

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Documentary filmmaker George Butler has been working on "The Lord God Bird," the only Cornell-endorsed film account of the IBWO search, as "a work in progress" since the beginning of this Arkansas-based saga. The independent film has been screened sparingly over recent years, and is included in upcoming Earth Day celebrations (next weekend) at the Berkshire Museum in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, if you're in the area:

http://berkshireonstage.com/2012/04/14/earth-day-with-george-butler-and-the-lord-god-bird-at-the-berkshire-museum/

An old 2007 John Trapp review of it here:

http://birdstuff.blogspot.com/2007/03/i-just-saw-lord-god-bird.html

The film was originally intended as "the first in a planned trilogy of films dealing with extinction," with subsequent entries to focus on the Royal Bengal Tiger and the Lowland Gorilla.
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-- Back to Atchafalaya --

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A semi-interesting post over at IBWO Researchers Forum from a prominent independent IBWO searcher regarding a recent double-knock in the Atchafalaya (he urges further investigation of the the area if possible):

http://www.ibwo.net/forum/showthread.php?p=5980#post5980

(As a note, the general Atchafalaya region of La. is the site of a great many historical Ivory-bill claims over the years, though the Cornell team that surveyed it didn't seem as impressed with it as several other regions.)

And on a complete sidebar, I've posted about the Madagascan Pochard previously, and a reader sends in this feel-good update on that possible conservation success:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/17616488
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