-- Auburn Update --

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Dr. Hill gives another update from the Choctawhatchee here, reporting on a couple of specific auditory encounters outside of their main focus area (no photo/video). Also, notes that potential IBWO sounds have declined in March from February, as might be expected if the birds have gone to nest... and an active nesthole of course would be the ultimate coup for any search group.

If you haven't yet got your hands on Dr. Hill's book you might want to read this posting from Fangsheath over at IBWO Researchers Forum, which summarizes a few of the notions therein:

http://www.ibwo.net/forum/showpost.php?p=1450&postcount=27

Dr. Hill is also due to release at some point their early IBWO video from the Choc. which was never deemed of sufficient quality for publication. Certainly we all enjoy seeing every shred of evidence available for these birds, but I'd caution folks not to expect too much from this piece of data... except likely more argument over 'artifacts,' 'shadow,' 'bleeding,' 'angle,' and the like.
BTW, I think Dr. Hill is to be highly commended for the openness and regularity of his public communications with interested parties --- a much higher frequency and degree of disclosure than seen from any other organized search group (having said that, there are good reasons for the non-disclosure of information in certain circumstances).
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-- Jackson Talks of Pascagoula --

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Short but interesting interview with Jerry Jackson here.

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-- Obits --

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The Choctaw. Team Nokuse blog has some links to stories about the unexpected Saturday death of wildlife artist Larry Chandler, whose depictions of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker are, by now, familiar to most (I have his license plate rendition and it is one of my favorites of the many IBWO portraits now available).
In an odd quirk of timing, the very following day, long-time birder and outspoken Ivory-bill skeptic Noel Wamer died at home in Florida; no details known to this writer.


...Another aside: feel compelled to pass along a new blog encountered while following some Ivory-bill links (it happens to have one IBWO-related post, but the blog looks interesting in its own right):

http://pinesabovesnow.blogspot.com/index.html

It's hosted by a writer I'm not familliar with, Julie Dunlap, but if you're a nature-lover or a Thoreau-lover, as I suspect many of my readers are, it looks of interest.

...and one final aside: a car in front of me today bore the following bumper sticker: "We're creating enemies faster than we can kill 'em" --- boy, if THAT doesn't sum up the achievements of an Administration 'twisting slowly, slowly in the wind'.....
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-- Atchafalaya and... --

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Another letdown in-so-much as the Cornell mobile search team doesn't say much IBWO-wise from Louisiana's Atchafalaya --- habitat not as impressive overall as one might've expected. They also spent some time at the Red River Refuge farther north --- I would hope this means they also took a look-see at the adjacent Three Rivers WMA, although they don't specifically mention it. Nor do they say where they are off to next (Texas Big Thicket, or staying in LA. a tad longer???). Their latest report here:

http://www.birds.cornell.edu/ivory/current0607/MSTtravellog/document_view

So, with a slow news day, I'll throw out a couple items of personal interest that recently caught my attention, but are totally non-Ivorybill-related (one of the perks of doing a blog, no matter what you claim your topic is, you can, on a moment's notice, promote some personal interest to a captive audience : - ))

1) I think Douglas Hofstadter (computer scientist, Indiana University) is one of the most wonderful and original thinkers of our times (which is NOT to imply that I comprehend even 50% of what he writes!) --- he has a new volume out on human consciousness, I Am A Strange Loop. If the workings of the human mind are of interest to you I suspect this volume will offer MUCH food for thought, and if you're already a Hofstadter fan than I need say no more, it'll be a must-read.

2)...and, something completely different: did we all have an ant farm as a kid? MY favorite insect is the Praying Mantis (I mean are they CO-O-O-O-L or what...), and I've sometimes thought, semi-seriously, that they would make great pets!! So yet another of cyberthrush's million-dollar ideas has been absconded with! --- I just noticed there are now "Praying Mantis Kits" in the toy stores that offer you a praying mantis environment to set up, and then apparently send away for an egg case they will mail you to put in place and watch the little guys from hatching thru jaw-chomping adulthood. Some may think it a bit exploitive, but I gotta think it beats ant farm. The box says for ages 8 and up (...hey, that's ME!!).

Tomorrow... hopefully back to the Lord God Bird.
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-- Lord God Bird Film et.al.--

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Once again, back to John Trapp today, who has an interesting review of sorts of George Butler's unfinished "The Lord God Bird" documentary over at his "Ivorybillsetcetera" blog (just kidding):

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

I know several folks have gotten Geoff Hill's new Ivorybill book over the Web, but still hearing from others who can't find it in local bookstores, and last I heard even Dr. Hill hadn't yet received his copies from Oxford Press. Don't know what that's all about. Nor since chancing upon the one lone copy I purchased have I seen it in my own local area; so for those having trouble finding it apparently you're in good company.

Surely this coming week we'll get updates from both Auburn and the Cornell mobile team...?

And heyyy, what's happened to the Septic? Wherefore art thou Ivorybilled Septic??? I'm having to revert to 'Dilbert' for my daily chuckles.


Addendum: On a sad note, David Luneau notes that Larry Chandler, who was responsible for some of the most widely seen Ivory-bill art since the Arkansas rediscovery, died March 16 from pneumonia complications.
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-- ...And Just For Fun --

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For the gamers amongst us! :

I s'pose it was bound to happen, although I still never would've predicted it --- John Trapp alerts us to a new PC birding simulation game in which the ultimate prize... of course... is re-discovery of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker! (I'm sure this moves rapidly high up onto T. Nelson's next Christmas list! ; - )
Check out more of the details here:

http://birdstuff.blogspot.com/2007/03/stealth-bird-watching.html

(Call me a fuddy-duddy, but I'll probably stick to Scrabble and gin rummy...)

In the meanwhile, what's taking the Cornell mobile team so much time in the Atchafalaya...?
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-- Collinson Followup... or, Let's All Move Along --

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By a sheer quirk of timing apparently, David Sibley et.al. have just published another letter in SCIENCE (which M. Collinson says makes his paper "irrelevant") asserting the Luneau video bird to be a Pileated. And (surprise, surprise) there is a rejoinder by Cornell's Fitzpatrick et.al. --- deja vu all over again!!??? (...It is somewhat interesting how much publicity these skeptical pieces attain while the rejoinders don't garner such news coverage; and Cornell is also preparing a rebuttal to Collinson, BTW). Again, all of this wearisome, obsessive focus on a narrow unresolvable argument leaves me reeling a bit from the tediousness of it all, the heat generated in place of light as it were. But hey, it does also send a couple of off-hand thoughts across my mind... :

1) Long ago I recall reading a 'spoof' scientific article using physics and complex math to 'prove' that it was impossible for heavier-than-air man-made objects to fly. And the authors predicted that with the article's publication planes would drop out of the sky with the new realization that what they did was impossible : - ))) Well, that's sorta how I feel about these latest articles --- searchers should start scouring the ground for Ivorybills, because from all the ('Ivory-bill extinct again') headlines I'm reading the birds will surely start plopping out of trees and to the ground any moment now when they realize they are all dead! ; - )

2) And a second thought --- quite awhile back, tongue-in-cheek, I wrote something to the effect, "the Luneau bird is a Muscovy Duck; now can we all please move along..." --- and I didn't receive nearly the press that Collinson is receiving!!! : - (((...BTW, if someone out there has a video of a Muscovy in retreat-mode please send it to Martin for analysis).

'Let's all move along' though really is the only take-home message I see in all of this 2-year-old video debate over a singular bird in a singular set of circumstances that will likely never be duplicated, with a host of uncontrolled variables. IF Ivory-bills are documented in Florida, or S.C., or Texas, or even in Arkansas or ANYwhere else, guess what? --- it will have NO specific bearing on the Luneau video -- THAT bird will remain debatable for eternity, so what is the point, really, with so much data yet to come from the field....

But I know I'm speaking largely to deaf ears.
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