-- USFWS's Bob Russell Speaking --

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I see Bob Russell, retired USFWS official and long-time IBWO searcher, is giving a talk this coming Thur. night (May 25) at the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge Center in Bloomington, MN.
If any readers here happen to hear his presentation please let us know whatever he has to say about the current outlook for the Ivory-bill.
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-- A Few Notes --

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A nice article on Iowa wood-carver Dean Hurliman for the many who know of him through this blog… and I can’t help but note that it ends with him saying, “I plan to do 10 more ivory-bills.” 10 more lucky people or groups out there somewhere.

http://www.thehawkeye.com/life/lifestyles/after-decades-making-duck-decoys-man-resurrects-extinct-bird-species/article_05faf99d-3e6e-51e7-a869-037fd55bbceb.html

Meanwhile, Project Coyote folks in central Louisiana are promising more discussion/analysis soon of recent kent-like sounds they’ve recorded in their search area.

And finally for your entertainment and discernment (nothing new here, but good bit of history) a recent 14-minute podcast on our favorite subject:

http://strangeanimalspodcast.com/podcast/episode-009-the-ivory-billed-woodpecker/

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-- South Carolina Claim --

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FWIW, long-time searcher George DeBusk reports a possible sighting in South Carolina (Francis Marion National Forest) on March 28 :

https://www.facebook.com/groups/179784035376368/permalink/1442692249085534/

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-- A Shout Out to Bill Pulliam --

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No IBWO news, but a quick shout out to Bill Pulliam today... just noticed that his small Tennessee community (and house!) took a direct hit from an EF-1 tornado yesterday. All's well with him as best I can tell, but no doubt a bit unnerving (I've only been in some wicked wind shears before, never a tornado, and those are scary enough!).
Many/most here, know that Bill has been a stalwart in the IBWO debate going back a long while (and is also very active in Tennessee birding).
I don't have a habit of citing events in people's personal lives here at the blog, but since folks haven't heard from Bill in a long while, just thought I'd give this update and wish him well.
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-- Bark Scaling Ideas --

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Recent post from Mark Michaels on bark scaling, especially of hickories, will be of potential interest to any ongoing searchers out there:

https://projectcoyoteibwo.com/2017/02/25/bark-an-exegesis/

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— Mississippi Tweeting —

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Just passing along this bit of Twitter trivia…

Occasionally people on Twitter report seeing an Ivory-billed Woodpecker (either recently or in the past), but rarely have any details lending credence to their claim. Once-in-a-long-while I see a tweet that may have some bit of plausibility. This week a scientist (astrophysicist) casually mentioned having seen an IBWO back in 1980. He was probably quite young back then and unaware of Pileated Woodpeckers, but nonetheless I explored it a little further and he writes “it was definitely an Ivory billed Woodpecker.” 

It was in a heavily wooded (and still today, he says, undeveloped) locale “in the area between the Tallahala Creek and Chickasawhay River” (southeast corner of Mississippi). That all makes it a bit more interesting since there was an official claim of an Ivory-bill for the large De Soto National Forest in that area in 1978, and probably more anecdotal claims for that area since.

Even if the claim is accurate, what, if anything, it means for us 37 years later I don’t know, but there it is.

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-- Drone Views From Mike Collins --

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Mike Collins has posted 30 videos (at current count) from drone flights over potential Ivory-bill habitat -- primarily sections of the Pearl River, but a couple of clips from Florida's Choctawhatchee, and a couple from the Apalachicola area (I assume, but don't know, that Mike took all these himself):

http://tinyurl.com/ja78zfa

Very pleasant, even mesmerizing, to watch, though hard to tell if such overview flights could ever give the resolution necessary to permit identification of an Ivory-bill below (unless by sheer chance one flew immediately beneath the drone)... in the 40-or-so random minutes I've viewed I've only seen one bird at all! IF a narrower area of potential IBWO activity was isolated then one can imagine flying the drone lower in a more concentrated way and perhaps picking up activity; also of course the views are better when the foliage is off the trees, as in the sample below:



Anyway, check 'em out for some relaxing viewing.

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-- And the Beat Goes On --

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I’ve been hesitant to link to this since it’s a lot of sound and fury that’s been argued before, but some may want to see it before it fades from view (and they are about to close out the thread), so I’ll note that the birding “ID Frontiers” listserv has had ongoing "discussion" (much of it superfluous) of Mike Collins’ latest piece here:

http://birding.aba.org/maillist/IDF

Mike, as usual attempts to reply to doubters, and interestingly one of the better known critics of Cornell’s original work, Martin Collinson, even weighs in cutting Mike a little slack.

On a separate side-note, Mark Michaels informs followers that Frank Wiley, of their search team, is in a hospital in Louisiana with a systemic infection. Am sure we all wish Frank a full recovery, and his family well:

https://projectcoyoteibwo.com/2017/02/03/frank-wiley-hospitalized/

ADDENDUM 2/5/17:  Sadly, Mark now reports that after taking a turn for the worse yesterday, including emergency surgery, Frank passed on this morning... Condolences to his many friends and family... I'm happy he was one of the recipients of the beautiful Ivory-bill sculptures given out by artist/carver Dean Hurliman... perhaps that piece can hold and represent many memories of Frank's passion, for his loved ones. 
https://projectcoyoteibwo.com/2017/02/05/in-memory-frank-wiley-1962-2017/

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-- Mike Collins Persists, With Open Access Paper --

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Once again Mike Collins has put together his evidence for Ivorybills in a published conservation paper, this time for an online, open access science journal (from Elsevier) called Heliyon:

http://www.heliyon.com/article/e00230/

(shorter news release here: https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-01/e-rcf011717.php)

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ADDENDUM:  “Concolor1” emailed me that he had some sort of difficulty posting a comment (don’t know if anyone else has?) but he wanted to provide a link to one of Mike’s YouTube videos, which was this one from Florida:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C0bQgyFSPOI&t=500s

Mike has a LOT of YouTube videos under his “IBWOvids” channel, but if I were going to point people to just one I would pick the discussion of his so-called “fly-under sighting” here (rather than the Florida vid):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQYpeV95Mnw

(I think many consider it to be his single best piece of evidence, while still not entirely convincing.)

Also, do note that if you scroll all the way down on the Heliyon article linked to above, under “Supplementary Content” Mike has 21 films that can be linked to.

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-- Goodbye To A Year That Will Live In Infamy --

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Feel like I should post something before end-of-year just to indicate I remain alive... or at least had a pulse last time I checked; so here's a fun, sped-up video from Tara Tanaka of a Pileated Woodpecker making a tree cavity:

Timelapse of a Pileated Woodpecker creating a cavity, shot in 4K with the GH4 from Tara Tanaka on Vimeo.

It's not the video I'd most like to see of course, but still fun to watch. The few remaining publicly-reporting searches continue to post occasional updates, but I've not heard anything promising in private email for a long while. 

Good Holidays to all.

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-- Checking In Before End of Summer --

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Sorry for long dry spell, but been busy this summer with other things, and none of the very few IBWO dribs and drabs I’ve heard reached a threshold worth passing along. Wouldn’t expect there to be much if any significant news before wintertime, and quite possibly not even then. (p.s… apologies to a few folks I just realized I never got back to in email this summer with IBWO being on such a backburner right now… I usually respond, to acknowledge emails, fairly quickly, but a few have slipped by, though I do still enjoy hearing people’s ideas).

Also, thanks to all who have written about their delight in receiving one of Dean Hurliman’s incredible life-size sculptures. I know Dean requests folks to email me, though it really isn’t necessary unless you feel so-compelled, and I’ve certainly heard from enough recipients by now to know how appreciated these generous gifts are. At the very least they are fantastic mementos and heirlooms of the creature that transfixes us, and, if ever finally documented, perhaps Dean’s work might even one day have major art or collectable value (…or 100 years from now one will show up on “Antiques Roadshow”! ;-)

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-- Ivory-bills Coming Before Winter! --

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Well, wooden ones anyway!

Wood carver par excellence, Dean H. will have more Ivory-bills ready to ship before this coming winter. Those who received these life-size beauties last year were overwhelmed both with the specimens themselves and with Dean's generosity. Here is the verbatim note he sent along to me awhile back about coming offerings:

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Once again presented to partisans and fellow travelers:  a few carvings of the American Bird-of-Paradise Lost.  Free.  Post-paid. Skeptics check the blog of Sept. 30, 2015 and with CyberThrush.

Welcome centers and educational arenas will find this IBW a commanding addition to entryway or exhibit.  Let no indecisive committee table a request.

Remember a letter of rank enthusiasm.  Stay positive -- no debunkers, dilletantes or deadwood.        

-- Dean

How grateful I am that the mystery and romance of this seemingly lost bird has followed me far into adulthood.

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Hey, are there any better things in life than "mystery and romance"! :-) 
And as you can see Dean is especially interested in seeing some of these artworks make their way to appropriate museums and educational centers -- what a GREAT idea!!! If you can spread the word and help make that happen feel free to.

Contact Dean here:  faithluth@gmail.com

He also does several other species, especially waterfowl/decoys, so if there's something specific you're looking for, probably worth checking with him (unlike the IBWOs, those may have a price or charge for shipping). And if your interest is solely in the IBWO I'd touch base with him ASAP, since the order-list could fill up quickly.

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-- Summer Doldrums --

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Summer rapidly approaches with full leaf-out, heat, humidity, bugs, snakes, Zika! etc... a time of diminished IBWO searching, so not expecting to post much in next few months. Obviously, very few areas even getting much organized attention these days. As I'm too busy with other things right now, maybe just as well.
Anyway, IF the blog goes silent for a good while, I'm still around, but just not finding much to get excited over. We'll see what, if anything, transpires next winter. Meanwhile, continue to follow some of the left-hand IBWO links for any updates.

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-- Cuba Narrative --

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New Audubon Magazine journalist's account of the Ivory-bill quest to Cuba:

http://www.audubon.org/magazine/may-june-2016/can-ivory-billed-woodpecker-be-found-cuba

ADDENDUM: after just 2 weeks, Tim Gallagher wraps up the failed, pessimistic Cuba search here (but vows to continue searching areas of the U.S. Southeast):

https://www.audubon.org/news/day-14-one-last-lead
 
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-- On To Cuba --

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With American-Cuban relations thawed, Tim Gallagher, veteran of the Arkansas Ivory-bill search (and others) has gone to Cuba with Martjan Lammertink and others to again look for the elusive species.
Audubon begins reporting on his effort here:
https://www.audubon.org/news/the-quest-ivory-billed-woodpecker-heads-cuba

And Gallagher's own journal entries will be here:
https://www.audubon.org/section/chasing-ivory-bill

I'm not overly hopeful of a small team finding the birds in Cuba (not clear to me how long the team will spend?), even on the slender possibility of some remaining there, but it will at least add one more data point to the few searches remaining in the American Southeast. Wish them well.

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-- Mark Michaels on the Radio --

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Project Coyote's Mark Michaels was on the radio tonight for 40 mins. discussing the Ivory-bill and their Louisiana search:
http://heritageradionetwork.org/podcast/project-coyote-independant-ivory-billed-woodpecker-searches-in-louisiana/

I tend to assume that most readers here do check the Project Coyote site on a regular basis, but in case not, the last posting (regarding an area of plentiful bark-scaling) is here:
http://projectcoyoteibwo.com/2016/03/30/trip-report-march-20-26-2016/

I'm continuing to keep "comments" off for awhile, though folks can always email me if necessary.

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-- Back To 2005 --

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Today, re-running an entry I posted here over 10 years ago!
Recently Mark Michaels linked to an older Geoff Hill review of a Noel Snyder monograph where he [Snyder] argues that hunting played a much greater role in the demise of the Ivory-bill than generally recognized (definitely worth reading):
http://www.bioone.org/doi/pdf/10.1525/cond.2008.8658

I made the same essential argument here a decade ago (in a different post), and to give people their due, Mike Collins made a similar argument as far back as 1997. At the time I utilized this quote from T. Gilbert Pearson, one of the foremost naturalists of his day:

"The reduction in abundance of this species [IBWOs] is due most probably to persecution by man, as the species has been shot relentlessly without particular cause except curiosity and a desire for the feathers or beaks." (National Geographic Magazine, April 1933)

The reason I bring it up now is to again reiterate my belief that very little that is concluded in the literature about the behavior or needs of Ivory-billed Woodpeckers, based on Tanner's work, can be assumed true for currently surviving IBWOs. I don't even believe Tanner's conclusions for the Singer Tract birds automatically generalizes to any Ivory-bills that then survived in Texas, Florida, South Carolina, or elsewhere -- we just don't know -- the sample size, studied largely by a lone individual, is simply too small to be very meaningful (p.s., I DON'T blame Tanner for this; it is common practice in field biology to draw over-reaching conclusions from inadequate sample-sizes -- nor do I mean to imply that the historical studies lack any merit, but only that they must be viewed cautiously, instead of as gospel fact).

Anyway, here's what I wrote, more generally, back in 2005, in the post "Science and Sample Size":
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One of the fundamental tenets of science methodology concerns having adequate sample sizes from which to draw conclusions/generalizations. In the years since James Tanner's dissertation on the Ivory-bill (based on but a handful of birds), notions that Tanner himself often recognized as tentative became hardened into unchallenged dictums without a good basis for doing so. There is in fact little that can be stated with certainty about the Ivory-bill's diet, behavior, habits, or requirements for survival, even though such statements are rife in the literature. (If one were to intensely study a dozen people and then write a report generalizing to the entire human species the weakness would be readily apparent.) This is all especially true given that any Ivory-bills still around today may in fact have survived specifically BECAUSE they came from individuals with significantly DIFFERENT characteristics/behavioral traits from their brethren, which increased survivability for themselves and their offspring. At least Tanner got it right at the end of his original introduction:

"The chief difficulty of the study has been that of drawing conclusions from relatively few observations... My own observations of the birds have been entirely confined to a few individuals in one part of Louisiana... the conclusions drawn from them will not necessarily apply to the species as it once was nor to individuals living in other areas. The difficulty of finding the birds, even when their whereabouts was known, also limited the number of observations. Especially was this true in the non-breeding season. With these considerations in mind, one must draw conclusions carefully and with reservations." (italics added)

The problem with our knowledge of Ivory-bills is not simply how little we know, but rather how much we think we know that might just be utterly wrong for any birds remaining today...
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-- Intermission --

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One quick 'housekeeping' note:
I don't mind anonymous or pseudonymous commenters, but would prefer if folks adopted a consistent identifying sign-off (fake name, initials, whatever), just so we can keep track of which anonymous comments hang together from the same individual, and which are new/different commenters.
But otherwise continue the comment discussions below, and meanwhile, enjoy a video:


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