Ivory-Billed Woodpecker continued (1 Viewer)

[raymie]

From recovery Plan page 2:

Compelling evidence of the species’ existence was obtained when the Ivory-billed Woodpecker was reported in Arkansas and presented by Fitzpatrick et al. (2005). On February 11, 2004, kayaker Gene Sparling observed a large woodpecker with characteristics of an Ivory-billed Woodpecker in Arkansas. The encounter spurred an extensive search led by the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology and the Arkansas Nature Conservancy. In 2004 and 2005 observers reported multiple sightings and recorded audio and video interpreted to be an Ivory-billed Woodpecker within the same area as Sparling along Bayou DeView, located in the Cache River National Wildlife Refuge (NWR) in east-central Arkansas. Interpretation of the video has been challenged by others (Jackson 2006, Sibley et al. 2006).

End

USFWS ES Recovery Plans do NOT present evidence although some might be in there. For example you will not see much or anything about the book-like stack of evidence of Ivory-bills existence recently from Florida of ~ 4 birds by Auburn and Windsor University (many sets of field notes, hundred of knocks and kents by ARUs and people, videos, roost measurements) . You will not see much or any of the evidence from LA, Louisiana, by multiple researchers (Videos independently confirmed by peers as IBWO, several papers, audio, stills, field notes, field logs etc).

I assure you IBs existed after the Recovery Plan was out ten years ago. See upthread in last 2 threads by the way for comments on how skeptics watered down the effectiveness of the paid for surveys. The surveys used erroneous methods and relatively inexperienced surveyors. The whole thing was a typical government fiasco.

thank you

I would love to see this evidence.

 

[1TruthSeeker]

Hmmm thanks for the email message I just received; these BF conversations seem to have produced it. This messAGE was triggered by two of you up a forum or two pertaining to Cuba.

There was a claim that Jackson said this:

That was my best U.S. experience with the birds,” he said. In Cuba, in March of 1988, Dr. Jackson said he heard Ivory-billeds for eight straight days. “We got a glimpse of what surely was an Ivory-billed,” he said. “The bird flew by about 30 feet in front of me, black and white, size of crow or bigger, no red, but there is nothing else there like that, nothing that size.”

I have confirmed the article exists and had seen it before and the exact quote exists so the claim in the email is true .

There is a pertinent point to this but more contacts must be made to go any further about possibly mutable stories on multiple details of this, at the time huge event, involving Short, Jackson et al. in east Cuba. Nothing surprises me much but author error is possible but on multiple details.?//?

Regardless the blatant flip flopping of standards by Jackson over what was acceptable as a publishable earth shattering IB find in '80s vs what he demanded from the USA just 15 years later. Cuban/Jackson had literally 0% of Supporting Material and physical evidence and maybe 5% of the field note evidence presented for the US IB in only one US state.

anyway thanks to you two

 

[Tired]

Timber companies having a vested monetary interest in there not being anything to protect in logging areas is a very good point. However, they can't step on anything. How long have people with reliable cameras been out looking for IB? How many people have tried? Has there really been no evidence whatsoever for 15 years? Even if people did actually see a single IB in 2005, has there been anything in that area since, to indicate that there were ever more?

I believe someone brought up de-extinction earlier in the thread. Assuming cloning and other relevant technologies are up to the task at some relatively imminent point, would this bird be a candidate? From what I know, this would require at least one good DNA sample (preferably far more, to be able to actually establish the species), the ability to raise the resulting babies in captivity, and the ability to either maintain them long-term in captivity or, preferably, to do so and also begin to establish them back in the wild.

For example, thylacines aren't a good candidate for de-extinction because they're marsupials. Marsupials' milk changes formula over time as the babies grow, in unpredictable ways. It's difficult enough to raise marsupials that we can study in person, and no one knows what a thylacine's milk would be like. Cloning them would only result in a great deal of trial and error with the milk formula, ending with many malnourished or outright dead babies.

I've never tried to raise woodpeckers in captivity, obviously. But people have successfully raised hummingbirds to adulthood, and it seems to me that there can't be many birds much more difficult to raise than that. Housing such skittish birds would be a potential problem, but it's been managed with others. Both other skittish birds, and other woodpeckers. Since other woodpeckers exist which are large enough to be confused with a small IB, maybe they could make good surrogate parents. I wonder if an IB raised by other woodpeckers would retain the double-knock pattern? They would probably need a very large aviary, with multiple tree trunks mounted in it. They wouldn't likely make a very good zoo exhibit, too hard for guests to spot and too skittish for their own benefit, but plenty of species are maintained in captivity without being exhibited.

(I'm aware that this speculation isn't exactly about whether or not the IB still exists. But it might be more interesting than just continuing to argue back and forth about whether they still exist in the wild. Whether or not they exist in the wild, a captive-breeding program would be incredibly beneficial to the species. And, "can we make it definitely exist" is a close enough question to "does it exist already".)

 

[Sangahyando]

Timber companies having a vested monetary interest in there not being anything to protect in logging areas is a very good point. However, they can't step on anything. How long have people with reliable cameras been out looking for IB? How many people have tried? Has there really been no evidence whatsoever for 15 years? Even if people did actually see a single IB in 2005, has there been anything in that area since, to indicate that there were ever more?

That is why I recommended (a few pages ago) looking for another endangered animal/plant that is still around and whose existence is easier to prove than IB. The question is, what do our truthseeking friends care more about, reaping the glory for the rediscovery of a "supposedly" extinct bird, or preserving an entire ecosystem that might even, in the distant future, house said bird again once it's brought back from extinction?

 

[1TruthSeeker]

Timber companies having a vested monetary interest in there not being anything to protect in logging areas is a very good point. However, they can't step on anything. How long have people with reliable cameras been out looking for IB? How many people have tried? Has there really been no evidence whatsoever for 15 years? Even if people did actually see a single IB in 2005, has there been anything in that area since, to indicate that there were ever more?

I believe someone brought up de-extinction earlier in the thread. Assuming cloning and other relevant technologies are up to the task at some relatively imminent point, would this bird be a candidate? From what I know, this would require at least one good DNA sample (preferably far more, to be able to actually establish the species), the ability to raise the resulting babies in captivity, and the ability to either maintain them long-term in captivity or, preferably, to do so and also begin to establish them back in the wild.

For example, thylacines aren't a good candidate for de-extinction because they're marsupials. Marsupials' milk changes formula over time as the babies grow, in unpredictable ways. It's difficult enough to raise marsupials that we can study in person, and no one knows what a thylacine's milk would be like. Cloning them would only result in a great deal of trial and error with the milk formula, ending with many malnourished or outright dead babies.

I've never tried to raise woodpeckers in captivity, obviously. But people have successfully raised hummingbirds to adulthood, and it seems to me that there can't be many birds much more difficult to raise than that. Housing such skittish birds would be a potential problem, but it's been managed with others. Both other skittish birds, and other woodpeckers. Since other woodpeckers exist which are large enough to be confused with a small IB, maybe they could make good surrogate parents. I wonder if an IB raised by other woodpeckers would retain the double-knock pattern? They would probably need a very large aviary, with multiple tree trunks mounted in it. They wouldn't likely make a very good zoo exhibit, too hard for guests to spot and too skittish for their own benefit, but plenty of species are maintained in captivity without being exhibited.

(I'm aware that this speculation isn't exactly about whether or not the IB still exists. But it might be more interesting than just continuing to argue back and forth about whether they still exist in the wild. Whether or not they exist in the wild, a captive-breeding program would be incredibly beneficial to the species. And, "can we make it definitely exist" is a close enough question to "does it exist already".)

This type of passion is of course needed; the initiative to explore all options.

There is plenty of evidence of presence in the last 15 years; in the last 25 IB pages it's mentioned over and over by various people. But to me and more importantly to the ESA protocols to trigger conservation funds and management, populations are what counts not just one bird here or there. These people that constantly chase the picture, some for 12 years now in LA are in a way molesting the birds.

But regardless of proponents with a "it's there! great" opinions there are not many IBs left. So your idea of breeding has been looked at but will very very likely almost certainly be rejected if the status quo exists.

First cloning does not improve genetic viability and who knows the epigenetic issues. Who knows the present IB coefficient of these birds? It could be horrible.

The cloning does not address the ecological problems the IBWO has. Proponents of the IB keep running around chasing the bird but do not ever seem to say "whooo why with all this improving acreage aren't there more birds?". They do not know what they are talking about or doing on all these points.

The cloning will not be able to replace the nurture and survival skills the parents pass on to their progeny. Do you know how long an IB stays with its parents ? A cloned IB will almost surely not be an IB. I personally do not even think the IB is even what it was 300 years ago in certain important but perhaps not critical ways.

That in a way leads to your last assertion that it is not interesting to discuss presence absence. Since there is a miniscule chance of a movie-like ending here as in Jurassic Park, the few birds left are our only hope and I mean every single one of them due to inbreeding and genetic drift.

The wild population perhaps should be the one and only interest.

thanks for your thoughts though

 

[Tired]

I haven't thoroughly read the whole of the discussion threads on the IB, because it's mostly arguing and not very pleasant to read. But I've read some of it, and skimmed others. Most of it is just people saying either "there's evidence" or "there's no evidence". I don't see much of the evidence actually being presented. Do you have links of credible IB evidence in, say, the past decade? I say the past decade, because if an IB was present over a decade ago, but hasn't been seen since, I would think it's probably gone. If there was a mated pair successfully breeding, wouldn't we expect to see more sightings of them in that area, or at least the same number? And if there isn't a mated pair successfully breeding, there aren't going to be IBs there for much longer, if there are at all. I'm also somewhat disinclined to trust single eyewitness reports- with a bird that would be this exciting to see, I can easily imagine someone's eyes fooling them, or someone outright fabricating it. Perhaps not intentionally- memory actually changes over time, and someone's mental image of something could be changed into something else.

I'm not talking about a captive-breeding program for IB. Captive breeding programs require live specimens. If we can't even reliably get photos of them, how is anyone ever going to catch any? I'm talking about cloning them from dead specimens. There is DNA present in taxidermy specimens, after all, and how many IBs were shot for taxidermy specimens once it became clear they were going extinct?

A cloned IB raised by non-IB parents would act differently, yes. But the question still stands, how differently? How much of their behavior is instinctive, versus taught? It's probably worth investigating, at the very least. And would a cloned IB, that acts a bit oddly, be better for a given stretch of habitat than no IBs at all? Surely you must agree that they aren't present in much of their former habitat. Maybe there would be some benefit to them being reintroduced. Their genes wouldn't pollute the gene pool, after all, if they were pure-bred IB.

And it's not that it's not interesting to discuss whether the IB is still alive. It's that it's pointless. This thread is pretty much entirely composed of people going in circles- one party saying "it's true, we have footage", the other saying "that footage is old and unclear", talking about the same bits of potential evidence over and over. No new conclusions are being reached, no one is changing their minds. And, again: if no one can even clearly photograph an IB, or find a nest, or even find fresh feather evidence, how is anyone ever going to catch them to breed, even if they do exist?

If you're interested in preserving IB habitat, I'd say that time would be better spent figuring out what else lives there. An IB is a big, charismatic bird that people are probably inclined to like, but there's no promise that they even still exist. Why not, instead, find half a dozen other likeable things that live in the same habitat, and campaign to protect the habitat for them? Or, perhaps in addition, campaign for the habitat to be preserved and restored so that cloned IBs can be released into it. "Other animals also live there, and maybe one day we can put these woodpeckers back into the wild" has more impact than "we have a tiny bit of evidence that one or two of these might have been alive at some prior point".

 

[1TruthSeeker]

Well the world and life are going to be filled with people discussing things and various forms of trolls or fools will be around. You need to determine who is what. One liners are usually from trolls for example. If they have 15,000 posts one must wonder too. There are exceptions of course. lol

You are from the US and on bird forum. You haven'tt heard of the conservation story of the century? Ivory-billed? It was found in east Texas at least into late last century. Big Thicket had birds for sure. At one time they were strong around Houston. The last birds are not far from you to the east. Sabine River is a mystery, one of the few places I haven't looked.

tks

 

[ZanderII]

Hmmm thanks for the email message I just received; these BF conversations seem to have produced it. This messAGE was triggered by two of you up a forum or two pertaining to Cuba.

There was a claim that Jackson said this:

That was my best U.S. experience with the birds,” he said. In Cuba, in March of 1988, Dr. Jackson said he heard Ivory-billeds for eight straight days. “We got a glimpse of what surely was an Ivory-billed,” he said. “The bird flew by about 30 feet in front of me, black and white, size of crow or bigger, no red, but there is nothing else there like that, nothing that size.”

I have confirmed the article exists and had seen it before and the exact quote exists so the claim in the email is true .

There is a pertinent point to this but more contacts must be made to go any further about possibly mutable stories on multiple details of this, at the time huge event, involving Short, Jackson et al. in east Cuba. Nothing surprises me much but author error is possible but on multiple details.?//?

Regardless the blatant flip flopping of standards by Jackson over what was acceptable as a publishable earth shattering IB find in '80s vs what he demanded from the USA just 15 years later. Cuban/Jackson had literally 0% of Supporting Material and physical evidence and maybe 5% of the field note evidence presented for the US IB in only one US state.

anyway thanks to you two

This was a double standard, Cuba was only more plausible because US birders hadn't looked and there is no sympatric Pileated, no evidence was returned and the sight records were glimpses only. I don't buy either of these rediscoveries.

 

[1TruthSeeker]

This was a double standard, Cuba was only more plausible because US birders hadn't looked and there is no sympatric Pileated, no evidence was returned and the sight records were glimpses only. I don't buy either of these rediscoveries.

You were one of those above I believe that were involved with the Cuban event discussion. Whatever you two did you got somebody going about Jackson and then I brought it up and someone else likely reading BF, as a guest I assume, emailed me about another Jackson inconsistency about his variable story on just the Cuban events. But still It could be an author error but on several points?. I think that author is still alive; I recognized the name.

Not sure what is more bizarre, BF itself, Jackson or the idea of cloning. All in a few days. Great!

PS though the second half of your post (US IB was not rediscovered) is completely wrong, and even though you will obviously not admit that, you must acquiesce there are hundreds of pages of recent IB evidence rather than the 5 pages from 1986 to 1988 Cuba.

But regardless I thank you for whatever happened well above, cheers.

 

[1TruthSeeker]

I haven't thoroughly read the whole of the discussion threads on the IB, because it's mostly arguing and not very pleasant to read. But I've read some of it, and skimmed others. Most of it is just people saying either "there's evidence" or "there's no evidence". I don't see much of the evidence actually being presented. Do you have links of credible IB evidence in, say, the past decade? I say the past decade, because if an IB was present over a decade ago, but hasn't been seen since, I would think it's probably gone. If there was a mated pair successfully breeding, wouldn't we expect to see more sightings of them in that area, or at least the same number? And if there isn't a mated pair successfully breeding, there aren't going to be IBs there for much longer, if there are at all. I'm also somewhat disinclined to trust single eyewitness reports- with a bird that would be this exciting to see, I can easily imagine someone's eyes fooling them, or someone outright fabricating it. Perhaps not intentionally- memory actually changes over time, and someone's mental image of something could be changed into something else.

I'm not talking about a captive-breeding program for IB. Captive breeding programs require live specimens. If we can't even reliably get photos of them, how is anyone ever going to catch any? I'm talking about cloning them from dead specimens. There is DNA present in taxidermy specimens, after all, and how many IBs were shot for taxidermy specimens once it became clear they were going extinct?

A cloned IB raised by non-IB parents would act differently, yes. But the question still stands, how differently? How much of their behavior is instinctive, versus taught? It's probably worth investigating, at the very least. And would a cloned IB, that acts a bit oddly, be better for a given stretch of habitat than no IBs at all? Surely you must agree that they aren't present in much of their former habitat. Maybe there would be some benefit to them being reintroduced. Their genes wouldn't pollute the gene pool, after all, if they were pure-bred IB.

And it's not that it's not interesting to discuss whether the IB is still alive. It's that it's pointless. This thread is pretty much entirely composed of people going in circles- one party saying "it's true, we have footage", the other saying "that footage is old and unclear", talking about the same bits of potential evidence over and over. No new conclusions are being reached, no one is changing their minds. And, again: if no one can even clearly photograph an IB, or find a nest, or even find fresh feather evidence, how is anyone ever going to catch them to breed, even if they do exist?

If you're interested in preserving IB habitat, I'd say that time would be better spent figuring out what else lives there. An IB is a big, charismatic bird that people are probably inclined to like, but there's no promise that they even still exist. Why not, instead, find half a dozen other likeable things that live in the same habitat, and campaign to protect the habitat for them? Or, perhaps in addition, campaign for the habitat to be preserved and restored so that cloned IBs can be released into it. "Other animals also live there, and maybe one day we can put these woodpeckers back into the wild" has more impact than "we have a tiny bit of evidence that one or two of these might have been alive at some prior point".

Hello Tired,

It's good to read the posts so then you can apply your knowledge forming a honed list of hypothetical questions and more pragmatic programs/plans. Knowing something about the target specie's problems with ecological, genetic, regulatory, budgetary, industrial and political pressures may simplify the many, many huge tasks to be confronted in your very ambitious post. Your ideas are ahead of their time; this not a bad thing compared to the usual governments and NGOs almost always leading from behind .

But still proposing the "programs" you have in one BF post is simply staggering in context of tight budgets, exponentially increasing species needing help, China/US/INDIA/etc. devouring resources and land that we all demand and much more. Every dollar that went to the IB recently was given begrudgingly by some, while a very few were unscrupulous in their damaging of surveys and the Rec. Plan, elbowing, moaning, lying and the scapegoating of the IB for all of conservation's huge problems.

Idealistic or perfect conservation proposed on paper is very different from real world conservation funding impediments, efforts, implementation and results. The only good news is that acreage for IBs is already preserved or has been pragmatically made impossible to develop because of flood regimes. Habitat management is however needed and specific papers/plans to increase standing dead wood, manage to develop more late seral forests, more, has allegedly been implemented to a small degree on a few public lands. Volunteers could have been organized to girdle trees as "nursery areas" for beetles and IB nests ( a great place to set up cameras for this allegedly critical picture) but instead 15 years have been lost trying to prove that one can get a picture or video of the fourth or fifth bird in by disparate methods with no tempospatial continuity.

Now on to an abridged look at a few of the many real and expensive problems with cloning. Three were brought up but you really didn't address them since you were postulating that any of these problems are dwarfed by the present state of extinction or pending extinction. Extinction is far from confirmed with recent detections. So again the problems to be addressed 1. cloning does not improve genetic viability and risks unknown epigenetic issues 2. The significant ecological problems have not been addressed and corrected to harbor cloned birds, 3. Nurture and parental care will be lost and the cloned will effectively not be viable IBs as starvation, predation and a breakdown in the complex breeding phenology is likely.

And for just a few more of the problems 4. No bird species I know of has been cloned, even domestic. Birds have no uterus; forming and growing embryos in a rotating egg has many more unproven extras steps than forming an growing a clone embryo in mammals (details beyond what can be easily related here) 5. The genome of IB is not known 6, Specimens heavily contaminated with arsenic can impede DNA work; almost all specimens will be more than 100 years old, and therefore there is some small to larger chance that no DNA can be recovered. 7. telomeres of older IB specimens may result in clones that when hatched have an age of 3 to 15 ? years old already. 8. Mortality rates of embryo clones, immature clones; adult clones can be expected to be higher than nominal rates 9. You better have a huge check book of close to 50 to 100 million dollars for a program with no guarantees. 10) to 20) if needed.

Since we are not at the point of extinction as breeding birds are still allegedly out there and efforts to do correct surveys have basically ceased. meaning birds can still be in various areas cloning is not called for yet.

Past Cornell/USFWS designed survey efforts have produced false negatives in my opinion; these concerns were passed on to a few of the powers to be. Amateur efforts have basically been unsuccessfully chasing a picture accept for a very few, the best being Collins who made some good, out of the box choices and worked everyday for years in IB habitat; but he was ill equipped to influence policy. The LA group has also done some recent good work and has gathered solid acoustic data and some suggestive photographs. FL had at least 4 birds 7-10 years ago and SC has a few pairs likely, years ago.

So with 3 million acres of unsurveyed/badly surveyed habitat, with a few detections recently, with a species as wary as this, we can not rush to a technology, cloning, that does not even exist for the IB nor any bird. In addition we have not even made an effort to manage even a thousand acres of the millions we have for IBs. If you wrote a check today for 20 million USD no results can be predicted and no end date for even partial success can even be lied about with confidence. 20 million dollars spent on habitat management however will cautiously, but with a high probability, result in a doubling of bird numbers every ~ 6 years for 18 years.

TS

 

[raymie]

Well the world and life are going to be filled with people discussing things and various forms of trolls or fools will be around. You need to determine who is what. One liners are usually from trolls for example. If they have 15,000 posts one must wonder too. There are exceptions of course. lol

You are from the US and on bird forum. You haven'tt heard of the conservation story of the century? Ivory-billed? It was found in east Texas at least into late last century. Big Thicket had birds for sure. At one time they were strong around Houston. The last birds are not far from you to the east. Sabine River is a mystery, one of the few places I haven't looked.

tks

You just confirmed my suspicions as to who you are, I think. How many accounts do you have on this site?

 

[ZanderII]

PS though the second half of your post (US IB was not rediscovered) is completely wrong, and even though you will obviously not admit that, you must acquiesce there are hundreds of pages of recent IB evidence rather than the 5 pages from 1986 to 1988 Cuba.

But regardless I thank you for whatever happened well above, cheers.

There are hundreds of recent sightings of Thylacines too as I pointed out drawing parallels in another thread. People gave some of the early ones more credibility - just like the IBWO sightings in Cuba and the US but with the benefit of hindsight we can see it is all groupthink with a mountain of wafer thin evidence.

 

[1TruthSeeker]

There are hundreds of recent sightings of Thylacines too as I pointed out drawing parallels in another thread. People gave some of the early ones more credibility - just like the IBWO sightings in Cuba and the US but with the benefit of hindsight we can see it is all groupthink with a mountain of wafer thin evidence.

I always appreciate good science fiction. Z it was clearly said the EVIDENCE, not field notes as your eyes somehow saw (starting to understand how finding birds may be difficult for some). Again the evidence for US IB is hundreds of pages. As everyone likely knows science and even RBCs consider all the evidence; there is much more than Z can evidently let on. Field notes are a small fraction.

There will be a surprise coming soon. If anyone thinks they can record 100 double knocks in a forested riparian corridor of ANY WINGED ANIMAL with kents made by any WINGED ANIMAL it will be well worth your while in fish and chips plus a very large tip. I am sure crickets will be heard after the surprise on BF.

Any of the posters put on ignore and their families/relatives/bird club mates will be ineligible to participate.

TS

 

[RafaelMatias]

There will be a surprise coming soon.

Cool Make sure there's some hard evidence attached to it, otherwise I hope the reaction here won't be a surprise to you. Close scrutiny of evidence (as long as there's some) is obviously part of any scientific validation process, nothing really personal, but actually necessary and is usually very welcomed by authors.

 

[ZanderII]

I always appreciate good science fiction. Z it was clearly said the EVIDENCE, not field notes as your eyes somehow saw (starting to understand how finding birds may be difficult for some). Again the evidence for US IB is hundreds of pages. As everyone likely knows science and even RBCs consider all the evidence; there is much more than Z can evidently let on. Field notes are a small fraction.

Repeating from my previous posting 'you're not special'

This seems like a good time to drum home the comparison between the extinction of the Thylacine and the extinction of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker.

1) Both species were last documented at around the same time -1936 for the Thylacine and 1939 (last accepted IBWO sighting in 1944). Thylacines formerly occurred on the Australian mainland but there there is no proof they survived more recently than 3000 years ago.

2) Reports of both species have continued to the present day, for example the Department of Conservation and Land Management recorded 203 reports of sightings of the Thylacine in Western (mainland) Australia from 1936 to 1998.

3) Both species have had expensive official searches conducted and support from government, the Thylacine searches in Tasmania were conducted In 1982 following a sighting by a researcher with the Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Service. Those for IBWO because of sightings by birders, some experienced.

4) Official searches for both species failed to yield confirmatory evidence despite huge efforts and were eventually disbanded.

5) Both species have a huge scientific literature surrounding their extinction trajectory on account of their well-described declines to extinction and abundance of possible records.

6) 'Amateur' searchers are obsessed with both species and maintain that the Thylacine is widespread on both Tasmania and in mainland Australia and that the IBWO is distributed across multiple US states. Their blogs constantly report sightings with low quality evidence.

7) The searchers are reliant on brief sightings, poor quality images, tracks and signs, and ambiguous audio recordings. These are regularly presented as proof that both species are still extant, some examples in newspaper reporting:

Is this proof that the Tasmanian Tiger still roams Australia​

A trail camera has captured an image that has sparked a debate whether one of Australia's lost animals has a sub-species living in Perth.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Is this proof of a surviving Tasmasnian tiger?​

A farmer in Victoria spotted the creature while out walking near Clifton Springs on Friday, and managed to take a quick snap on his mobile phone.

www.dailymail.co.uk

8) There is no vouchered audio recording of the Thylacine so we have no way of knowing if the claimed recordings are of that species. Similar problems surround IBWO recordings - e.g. drums.

9) There are huge unclaimed bounties (over AU$ 1.75M for the Thylacine) for documentation proving either species exists.

10) Dedicated searchers are employing technology like drones and autonomous recording units to look for both species e.g. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-09...tigers-with-science-and-stealth/11388354?nw=0 again without success.

11) The searchers in both camps complain that the authorities don't take their claims seriously and deride experts, both sometimes publish their findings in scientific journals. Their blogs are incredibly similar in the language they use and their cultural identity as self-styled hard men who venture into remote areas into which others won't go and hence lack of success. This narrative creeps into scientific publications, this from Collins 2017:

"The interior of a swamp forest’s low species diversity does not attract bird watchers [12], and numerous deterrents may keep them away. It is physically demanding to penetrate deeply into such habitats; alligators, wild boars, and venomous snakes are abundant; and there is the possibility of heat stroke during the hot and humid summers and hypothermia during the cold and damp winters. Strong currents, rapidly rising water, and heavy hunting activity make swamp forests dangerous."

12) There have been many TV programmes covering the searchers from the perspective of these dedicated amateurs. In all of them the searchers maintain the species are extant, that they regularly see them and that proof is around the corner. Sometimes they claim they have it - like here but it always comes of nothing.

13) In both cases one could say that there is an overwhelming body of evidence that they are extant, hundreds of sightings, many by authoritative figures.

14) In both cases the absence of proof - photos, video, DNA, specimens - is indicative that the 'an overwhelming body of evidence' is nonsense - if the species are widespread the proof would be easy to find. As such it is reasonable to conclude that both are extinct and that belief in them has become quasi-religious and detached from objective scientific reality.

 

[1TruthSeeker]

Arkansas tape again, a good copy is also upthread . Taken where there were dozens of sighting before and after the video was taken in exact area. Double knocks recorded in area, Toggle back an forth and look at large white woodpecker similar only to the Imperial Woodpecker in many respects and MEASURED at 20 inches tall in two different perched areas. Pileated is 16 inches, flaps slower than this IB. as seen. and wing flaps measured in video. All N large Campephilus woodpeckers fly differently than Pileated in many ways. This is a blurry IB and was seen in the field. Camera was running on auto focus. Before take off scene and on video is a white saddled woodpecker 20 inches tall clinging to different tree before the takeoff. Bird moved to takeoff tree.

See minute 1:00 to about 1:30

Extinct Ivory Billed Woodpecker, Chasing a Ghost - Texas Parks & Wildlife [Official] - YouTube

These still captures below from a video of an IB perched and flying. Video by Collins. Video shows a large bulky long-necked woodpecker perched and hopping /flying between two trees. Link to video Ivory-billed Woodpecker: Context of the 2006 Video - YouTube

All this does not include much more evidence for each of these sightings. In addition Florida 2006 to 2013 has much evidence for same river. Can post more evidence if needed.

Pileateds in flight: pileated in flight - Google Search

 

[raymie]

Arkansas tape again, a good copy is also upthread . Taken where there were dozens of sighting before and after the video was taken in exact area. Double knocks recorded in area, Toggle back an forth and look at large white woodpecker similar only to the Imperial Woodpecker in many respects and MEASURED at 20 inches tall in two different perched areas. Pileated is 16 inches, flaps slower than this IB. as seen. and wing flaps measured in video. All N large Campephilus woodpeckers fly differently than Pileated in many ways. This is a blurry IB and was seen in the field. Camera was running on auto focus. Before take off scene and on video is a white saddled woodpecker 20 inches tall clinging to different tree before the takeoff. Bird moved to takeoff tree.

See minute 1:00 to about 1:30

Extinct Ivory Billed Woodpecker, Chasing a Ghost - Texas Parks & Wildlife [Official] - YouTube

These still captures below from a video of an IB perched and flying. Video by Collins. Video shows a large bulky long-necked woodpecker perched and hopping /flying between two trees. Link to video Ivory-billed Woodpecker: Context of the 2006 Video - YouTube

All this does not include much more evidence for each of these sightings. In addition Florida 2006 to 2013 has much evidence for same river. Can post more evidence if needed.

While certainly an interesting bird, I do not see how Pileated can be definitively ruled out from these photos.

 

[RafaelMatias]

I don't understand why the opinion of Julie Zickefoose (in one of the above images) is important here. As much as I admire her work, especially her brilliant illustration work, you must use the same criteria you've been using to classify other people's (such as Sibley's, and people in this forum) opinions (or oppinion relevance), which is to ask: how much work has she done with IBWO, and how many individuals of that species has she seen, etc. I suspect I know the answer to that. How is her opinion more relevant than anyone else's then. Also, that post is from 2006, and it would be relevant to know if she keeps the same point of view 15 years later.

 

[1TruthSeeker]

I don't understand why the opinion of Julie Zickefoose (in one of the above images) is important here. As much as I admire her work, especially her brilliant illustration work, you must use the same criteria you've been using to classify other people's (such as Sibley's, and people in this forum) opinions (or oppinion relevance), which is to ask: how much work has she done with IBWO, and how many individuals of that species has she seen, etc. I suspect I know the answer to that. How is her opinion more relevant than anyone else's then. Also, that post is from 2006, and it would be relevant to know if she keeps the same point of view 15 years later.

You did not look at the evidence at all or certainly not carefully per the immediacy of your comment. Upthread it was pointed out that pseudo skeptics have certain patterns of behavior; the shoe fits. It takes a bit of time to look at the evidence. I am not here to provide free mental diagnostics and therapy for pseudoskeptics and trolls, ass suming you are one, If you would like to discuss all the evidence honestly I am open only to that, but it is too late for you. The rudeness, lack of basic scientific protocol, lack of IB knowledge are noted.

Accepting either your obtuseness or ignorance of the evidence Sibley has never to my knowledge made any comments of the video and stills that Zickefoose comments on. Your question is bizarre: "How much work has she done on IB". Much more than Sibley. She has done multiple covers under contract for several authors. She studied skins, films, stills, literature, Audubon, pantings, etc. The covers were of flying birds, perched etc giving her various physiological knowledge of movement of IBs and relative proportions of body etc. .

Sibley on the other hand left out the IB in his guide; this was careless after the spectacularly long, Kulivan IB pair sighting of "99. I am sure you are not familiar with that either. When he finally did some work he made multiple mistakes. In addition Sibley was commenting on a pixelated bird that required various scientific, photographic and flight skills he does not have. JZ was commenting on a perched bird that was more resolved. DS was welcome to analyze it and chose not to even though he had much more expertise for the LA picture/video and much less for the AR video. It was his choice to enter an arena he was ill equipped for and not enter the LA video arena. Maybe he liked it as IB but was too entrenched to say anything; ask him.

You also did not read the post about the surprise correctly either.

It was nice knowing you.

 

[RafaelMatias]

The rudeness and lack of basic scientific protocol are noted.

Really?

Accepting either your obtuseness or ignorance of the evidence Sibley has never to my knowledge made any comments of the video and stills that Zickefoose comments on. Your question is bizarre: "How much work has she done on IB". Much more than Sibley. She has done multiple covers under contract for several authors. She studied skins, films, stills, literature, Audubon, pantings, etc. The covers were of flying birds, perched etc giving her various physiological knowledge of movement of IBs and relative proportions of body etc. .

I was talking of "real work" as you usually say in an accusative manner to others, field work, being out there in the swamps looking for the bird, etc. You show double standards. BTW I know of Julie Z's work very well, but it's illustrations. I've worked as an illustrator too (that's where I know JZ's work from), but I'm actually a biologist, so that's the kind of work I was referring to.

Sibley on the other hand left out the IB in his guide; this was carelessly after the spectacularly long Kulivan IB sighting of "99. I am sure you are not fmailiar with that either. When he finally did some work he made multiple mistakes.

I am aware of those, I don't see the relevance.

You also did not read the post about the surprise correctly either.

I'm waiting for the surprise. Don't take too long.

I think you lack a basic knowledge of what Science and the scientific process should look like. And what's the point of it all. It's not about the guy who shouts louder. Facts. Facts. Facts. Hard evidence. Testing. Peer review. Accepting limitations and failure as natural.