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Ivory-billed Woodpecker (formerly updates) (13 Viewers)

affe22 said:
Actually, if you read The Grail Bird you learn a lot more about Gene Sparling than has been stated in this thread. I don't want anything from you Mrs. Ellis outside of your name so I can do some follow-up on what you are saying. Hopefully Dr. Gallagher will email me back with the honest answer. If what you are saying is true, why don't you go public with the accusation that Dr. Gallagher and Gene Sparling are guilty of publishing misinformation? I imagine that it goes against some sort of printing law to publsih false events.

No offense to Mrs. Ellis but I believe that since the announcement people have to be even more discerning than they were before about IBWP sightings. Not that it is the case here but a person may falsify a sighting for a number of reasons and it would be easier to believe now.
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That is what I'm doing now isn't it??? Isn't this a Public forum? I am going public the only way I know how. On the top of the page does it not say the largest birding community? This is going public there are several thousand people that are members in this forum and I am letting them know my side.
 
affe22 said:
I'd hope there is something against completely fabricating a story that contradicts the true events especially in a nonfiction book. Generally people will at least publically argue it if they know the events published were not true. I plan on sharing Dr. Gallagher's response if he sends one. I'm not really too hopefully though.
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great point and I would love to pubilically argue the point especially with Gene Sparling and Conny Dickers. I'd love for them to come to a public debate. AND ESPECIALLY have Gene Sparling take a polygraph. Bet you he won't except the challenge but if he does I'd be there with BELLS ON !!!!!!
 
affe22 said:
Well, you do have a point. Sparling was one of the only people who kayaked the area repeatedly. That was stated by Gallagher in his book. Maybe he just liked the place and found it agreeable to kayak in though. I guess we may never know.
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have you ever kayaked through mud? Have you ever had to carry a kayak over snake infested and alligator infested murky swamp? Or have you just stayed in your warm dry little home? These are not nice clear kayaking areas that we are talking about apparently you have never researched this area///I on the other hand have lived here all of my life and I know what the waterway looks like first hand. If nothing else please either take the time to read or reread all of my threads. May be then you'll relize It's not somewhere you want to just to kayak in. Look other than what I told him he had no previous reason to even be in that area. He belived what I said enough to keep looking you said so yourself that he kept coming back over and over and over etc...I just wanted him to say thank you and he did but not PUBLICALLY which that is what I deserve. Put yourself in my position would you be happy?
 
Fishing4clues Im not trying to put you off, but swamping is not some new type of activity. Whether by foot or boat or even by kayak, not everyone is put off by mud, snakes and alligators. In fact to find and see these reptiles is one of the main reasons to go swamping in the first place. This is a popular activity in the Everglades. Granted there are not many people that are into this hobby, but the added oppurtunity to witness an IBWP would be a great benefit. Back to the forum: By the way are there updates available on the IBWP, any new sightings?
 
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I expect the trees will have to lose their leaves before we get any new sightings, certainly before we get those killer photos and redundant sightings of well-seen birds that everyone wants.
 
I don't have any new sightings to report, but a number of people, including myself, are working on developing diagnostics for distinguishing ivory-bill sign from pileated. It is too early to throw out numbers, but I will say this. A couple of ivory-bill nest cavities have been preserved. They contain ivory-bill gouge marks, which have a particular size distribution. Gouges in ivory-bill-free areas have been examined. They also have a specific size distribution. I think you get the idea.
 
This isn't exactly an update since it's a report from more than five years ago (Feb. 3, 2000, to be exact). After David Kulivan's sighting in the Honey Island Swamp became public, I decided to check it out. Being the world's luckiest birder, I stumbled upon an ivory-bill the first morning at Stennis Space Center, which is just across the Pearl River from the Honey Island Swamp. I didn't see it, but I heard it calling for a few minutes. There was nobody else in the area, which is restricted-access government property. So it definitely wasn't someone playing a tape. It was also clearly not a Blue Jay since the calls lasted so long. In 1924, Arthur Allen obtained a photo of an ivory-bill foraging in pine savannah. The calls that I heard were coming from similar habitat just to the east of the Pearl.

Until this year, I had only told a close birding friend and my wife about this experience. After reading Jerome Jackson's book and realizing that he believed the species still existed, I decided to tell him about it. Ironically, this was just a few weeks before the rediscovery was announced. Reading Jackson's book got the fire burning in me to start a serious search, and then suddenly the announcement came. That was definitely the most exciting week of my life. I started telling others about my experience and learned that there had been other sightings at Stennis and that sightings continue along the Pearl.

I never returned to the Pearl River area since the official searches seemed to indicate that those birds had moved on. After hearing about the difficulty of seeing the Arkansas bird and learning more about the species, I now believe the Honey Island searches were too concentrated around ground zero of Kulivan's sighting. I believe a persistent search over a large area has a good chance of being successful. That's what I plan to do. I hope that others will search in areas outside of Arkansas.
 
Ivory-bills in the Pearl/Bogue Chitto system may spend more time than usual in the adjacent pine forests in the coming years, as numerous wind-shaken pines will be attacked by beetles. Although the bottomlands will also see an increase in beetle numbers, pines, particularly loblolly and slash, are especially susceptible to beetle attack following storms. The birds may find this feast irresistible, and the next few years may present an excellent opportunity to see ivory-bills outside the cloak of the river swamp.
 
With all the high tech photography aids out there, I am sorely hoping that the coming winter months produce at least one outstanding shot to put the skeptics to rest.
 
Speaking of ivory-bill vocalizations, it was only this week that I found the recordings that were made by playing some of the old Cornell sounds at at distance from the recorder. (The link on the CLO web site is kind of weird.) Two things about the 2005 recordings have bothered me:

1) the absence of a strong peak at about 650 hz, very prominent in the old recordings.
2) the fact that the "kents" are very sharp-edged in the old recordings, often with a sudden frequency rise at the beginning and end of each, also absent in the new recordings.

Looking at the spectra on the recordings made at a distance, it is readily apparent that both of these issues resolve. The 650 hz peak clearly does not propagate well through the forest (a surprise to me - low frequencies usually travel well). The abrupt frequency shifts at the beginning and end of each vocalization are utterly eliminated and the sound is much less sharp.

I encourage everyone to examine the spectra of these new recordings and compare them particularly to those of the blue jay "mimics."
 
fangsheath said:
Looking at the spectra on the recordings made at a distance, it is readily apparent that both of these issues resolve. The 650 hz peak clearly does not propagate well through the forest (a surprise to me - low frequencies usually travel well).
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If you look at the spectrum for particular source (bird) and receiver (microphone) locations, there will be peaks and nulls that are due to multipaths and interference effects that have nothing to do with how well the sound travels through the forest. This could be what you are seeing. If so, the effect will change if either the source or receiver moves to a different position.
 
fangsheath said:
How do the 2005 recordings compare to what you remember from your 2000 encounter?
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The calls were fairly loud. The source seemed to be perhaps 100 yards away in pine savannah. So you wouldn't expect much distortion. Indeed, the calls were a dead ringer for the 1935 recordings. There was an intervening ditch and vegetation that partially blocked my view but also gave me cover. Since I was not able to see the bird, I decided to cross the ditch. I probably should have stayed within the cover and waited. It was a tough decision. The calls stopped after I crossed the ditch. I searched the area for a few hours but never heard the calls again.
 
I went to our local audubon meeting last night and heard a talk by Jerry Jackson who IM sure you have heard of. He strongly disputes the video evidence taken by the re-discoverers and claims that the footage is of a Pileated Woodpecker. I have watched the video and its hard to say its so poor but there is an awful lot of white on the wings. Has anyone else seen the video clip? I hope more pictures and video are taken to prove beyond doubt either way that the species still exists in the US.
 
Limeybirder said:
I went to our local audubon meeting last night and heard a talk by Jerry Jackson who IM sure you have heard of. He strongly disputes the video evidence taken by the re-discoverers and claims that the footage is of a Pileated Woodpecker. I have watched the video and its hard to say its so poor but there is an awful lot of white on the wings. Has anyone else seen the video clip? I hope more pictures and video are taken to prove beyond doubt either way that the species still exists in the US.
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I'm just curious what some of his points were. Do you think you could share?
 
affe22 said:
I'm just curious what some of his points were. Do you think you could share?
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He basically said that the video shows that the bird only had white on the underwing and it didnt have white secondaries. He went on about some kind of halo effect whatever that meant. To be honest the whole thing was very disppointing and quite a few people left with long faces. He didnt really elaborate on his reasoning. I hate to say it but it reaked of sour grapes because he then went on to say that he believed the species still exists and that we should keep an eye out for them here in North Florida.
I have to admit I was very skeptical when the news broke but have an open mind and so want them to be right. Hopefully further evidence will prove the birds existence or not but to be quite frank I think he was peeved at not being invited on the expedition. Unfortunately we didnt get a chance to ask questions at the end because they quickly proceeded with a book signing session.
 
What I read in your report is that Jackson thinks the video is not of an IBWO, but that the IBWO certainly still exists. Jackson has been cited by some as an IBWO skeptic. OK, he's skeptical of the video, but not of the IBWO's survival. If we're to believe Laura Erickson, many of those who saw the video on a big screen at the AOU meeting last month were convinced that it was an Ivory-bill. Review her late August posts in: http://birdwatching.birderblog.com/
 
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