As many of you undoubtedly know, a short video of what might be an ivory-billed woodpecker was captured in 2004 in an Arkansas swamp. However, further analysis casts more doubt as to the identity of the bird in the footage: the videoed bird appears to flap its wings at 8.6 times per second -- the rate of a pileated woodpecker, Dryocopus pileatus. Additionally, Martin Collinson from Aberdeen University, UK, has re-analyzed the footage and says the bird in the pictures appears to have black trailing wing edges rather than the unique white features associated with the ivory-billed woodpecker, Campephilus principalis (pictured, right).
"A poor quality video of pileated woodpeckers can look like ivory-billed woodpeckers -- and in that respect it can catch an observer out; and a mistake can be made. And in this case, I think a mistake has been made," said Collinson. As I and many others, including Collinson, have asserted, the Ivory-Billed woodpecker's large size and distinctive plumage would surely have given it away by now in the many follow-up surveys.
"The ivory-billed woodpecker isn't some small brown bird that can only be identified by one in a thousand; it's an enormous black and white bird with a red head," argued Collinson. Granted, these swamps are pretty remote, but there are hundreds of people there, right now, looking for the ivory-billed woodpecker. Eventually these birds would be sighted.
Researchers still hope that one of the many robot bird-watchers may record the elusive bird on film.
"I am happy to be proved wrong; a good photo would end this debate," said Collinson.
I agree wholeheartedly: I would be thrilled to be proven wrong.
Cited story.
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Comments
I was not a mistake, it was a deliberate ploy to put Arkansas back on the map, after it lost its significance ever since Clinton's departure from the Whitehouse!
Posted by: Hans | March 16, 2007 5:34 PM
There has been a lot of attention in Arkansas, but almost no media mention of the sightings/studies going on in Florida. I'm taking ornithology from Geoff Hill this semester, he's got a team of grad students down on the Choctawhatchee right now recording calls, sightings, bark scalings, nest holes, etc because they're convinced they've found a population. I guess their lack of a movie, like Cornell had, has made it a little less intriguing for the public, and even they will be the first ones to admit that without photos all they have is anecdotes so far...
Posted by: Anne-Marie | March 16, 2007 5:56 PM
There was another exchange on this is Science (I can send you the pdf if you want). I always read these letters for entertainment: "Yes, but in frame 1347, pixel 3392 is dark grey, not light grey!".
OK, it's not quite that bad yet. But it's getting close to silly. My own theory is that the Ivory-billed woodpeckers are going around disguised as Elvis.
Bob
Posted by: Bob O'H | March 17, 2007 3:28 AM
Why is Martin Collinson's opinion now the Bible of Ornithology? The brilliant researchers at Cornell put many, many hours reviewing this videotape with the initial hypothesis that this was NOT an ivory-billed woodpecker, and they could not prove that it was a pileated.
Posted by: Cynthia K | March 19, 2007 3:37 PM