Jane Turner
Well-known member
This would appear to make Cincloides superhuman, since he seems to be able to see Ivorvy-bills every time he goes out.... more or less 
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Ivory-billed Woodpecker (formerly updates) (79 Viewers)
- Thread starter KC Foggin
- Start date
Sidewinder
Well-known member
Ilya Maclean said:
Sorry, Ilya; I had missed your comments on cultural changes.
As I mentioned in my post, there's a lot we don't know and can only speculate on regarding change. As far as epigenetics is concerned--the inheritance of acquired traits--research is in its infancy and at this point has focused largely on the link between nutrition and health in mammals (where all the research money is at). However, if the early diet of a mouse can affect both the phenotypic appearance (such as fur color) and health of its offspring, as well as that of the subsequent generation (contrary to all notions most of us were taught in college), then we should be open to other possibilities for which environmental influences might affect heritable traits. And not just in mammals. Who knows whether diet or other influences could lead to subtle but important and perhaps even rapid changes in morphology (appearance), physiology, or behavior or birds? Because the changes are heritable, they could well be subject to natural selection, but their origin would be very different from the base pair mutations we normally think of as the raw substrate for evolution, and the pace of change might be very different, too. It might be fun to speculate further, but there's really no point in doing so.
If someone eventually gets incontrovertable evidence of the IBWO's persistence, then we need to concede at least one or both of two obvious conclusions: either the bird's behavior has failed to meet any of our expectations, or we simply had little understanding of what some have been heatedly arguing about.
pcoin
Well-known member
Sparling's initial Ark sighting--pre-Cornell involvement
Yes, that was Sparling's sighting that started the whole flap in Arkansas. He was a private person, not part of any Cornell team because it did not exist then. It was his reports that started the ball rolling.
None of the Cornell folks (ornithologists, trained volunteers, students, etc.) who came in to investigate ever saw the putative IBWO perched in Arkansas, according to the 2005 Science paper.
I really think Sparling saw one of the Pileateds undergoing a molt, showing more white (and yellowish white at that) when perched. We've been over this before, of course.
***
I guess there is Hicks' one sighting (Florida)where he reported a bird perched for a brief period.
humminbird said:
Yes, that was Sparling's sighting that started the whole flap in Arkansas. He was a private person, not part of any Cornell team because it did not exist then. It was his reports that started the ball rolling.
None of the Cornell folks (ornithologists, trained volunteers, students, etc.) who came in to investigate ever saw the putative IBWO perched in Arkansas, according to the 2005 Science paper.
I really think Sparling saw one of the Pileateds undergoing a molt, showing more white (and yellowish white at that) when perched. We've been over this before, of course.
***
I guess there is Hicks' one sighting (Florida)where he reported a bird perched for a brief period.
pcoin
Well-known member
Nail on the head--IBWO contradictions
Exactly--incredible contradictions abound in the claimed sightings and "detections":
1-Bird extremely wary, hard to approach and find, except for...
-Approached and photographed with a Brownie camera (Louisiana, 1971)
-Studied for 15 minutes (Kullivan, Louisiana, 1999)
-Seen by side of road, at close range, perched (Scott, Arkansas, 2003)
-Studied for some time, approached closely with kayak (Sparling, Arkansas, 2004)
-Seen flying across busy road, almost hit by truck--bird seen well enough that it is claimed to be a female
-Found within an hour of starting a search by boat (Hill et al., 2005, Florida)
-multiple sightings, multiple individual searchers, reported on this BirdForum thread
2-IBWO lives in remote areas, thus does not encounter people (but see above), BUT...
-IBWO wanders widely, nomadic. Exceptions:
-Bayou DeView, Arkansas IBWO (Elvis) seen 7 or more times (11 if you count Bobby Harrison's additional claimed sightings) over a period of one year in the same area (one or two square miles?). Latest word from Cornell is that it must have been lone wandering male. For a wanderer, it sure did hang about in the same area for a long time?
-Backyard sightings too numerous to mention. Missouri, Indiana, etc.
3-IBWO is super-rare, near extinct.
-But searchers have detected it in multiple states (Arkansas, Louisiana, Florida).
-Searchers are underway in Texas, South Carolina, etc., no doubt will document presence in those states soon.
4-IBWO now near-silent, seldom calls or double-knocks, but
-There are hundreds of good double-knocks and kent calls obtained by ARU's in Arkansas and Florida
-Plenty of auditory "detections" by Auburn searchers in Florida
Mike Johnston said:
Exactly--incredible contradictions abound in the claimed sightings and "detections":
1-Bird extremely wary, hard to approach and find, except for...
-Approached and photographed with a Brownie camera (Louisiana, 1971)
-Studied for 15 minutes (Kullivan, Louisiana, 1999)
-Seen by side of road, at close range, perched (Scott, Arkansas, 2003)
-Studied for some time, approached closely with kayak (Sparling, Arkansas, 2004)
-Seen flying across busy road, almost hit by truck--bird seen well enough that it is claimed to be a female
-Found within an hour of starting a search by boat (Hill et al., 2005, Florida)
-multiple sightings, multiple individual searchers, reported on this BirdForum thread
2-IBWO lives in remote areas, thus does not encounter people (but see above), BUT...
-IBWO wanders widely, nomadic. Exceptions:
-Bayou DeView, Arkansas IBWO (Elvis) seen 7 or more times (11 if you count Bobby Harrison's additional claimed sightings) over a period of one year in the same area (one or two square miles?). Latest word from Cornell is that it must have been lone wandering male. For a wanderer, it sure did hang about in the same area for a long time?
-Backyard sightings too numerous to mention. Missouri, Indiana, etc.
3-IBWO is super-rare, near extinct.
-But searchers have detected it in multiple states (Arkansas, Louisiana, Florida).
-Searchers are underway in Texas, South Carolina, etc., no doubt will document presence in those states soon.
4-IBWO now near-silent, seldom calls or double-knocks, but
-There are hundreds of good double-knocks and kent calls obtained by ARU's in Arkansas and Florida
-Plenty of auditory "detections" by Auburn searchers in Florida
pcoin
Well-known member
Claimed photos on VIREO (from 1960's?)
Somebody from the USFWS sent me a link to this photo on VIREO. You have to register (free, done by e-mail) to see the full-size photo.
(search for Ivory-billed)
The photos in question appear to be something at a roost hole, captioned:
w16/1/003
Ivory-billed Woodpecker
w16/1/002
Ivory-billed Woodpecker
w16/1/001
Ivory-billed Woodpecker
I registered and looked at the full-sized photos, and could not see much more detail. In some cases, the copyright notice obscures the bird.
There is no further information about the photos on VIREO. I read on some blog somewhere that these are reputed to have been taken in the Big Thicket in 1967 or thereabouts.
I don't know what to make of these photos, especially given the lack of documentation, but thought others might find them of interest, and do not recall them being mentioned in this thread previously. Opinions?
Somebody from the USFWS sent me a link to this photo on VIREO. You have to register (free, done by e-mail) to see the full-size photo.
(search for Ivory-billed)
The photos in question appear to be something at a roost hole, captioned:
w16/1/003
Ivory-billed Woodpecker
w16/1/002
Ivory-billed Woodpecker
w16/1/001
Ivory-billed Woodpecker
I registered and looked at the full-sized photos, and could not see much more detail. In some cases, the copyright notice obscures the bird.
There is no further information about the photos on VIREO. I read on some blog somewhere that these are reputed to have been taken in the Big Thicket in 1967 or thereabouts.
I don't know what to make of these photos, especially given the lack of documentation, but thought others might find them of interest, and do not recall them being mentioned in this thread previously. Opinions?
cyberthrush
Well-known member
pcoin said:
I believe these Luneau-ish : - ) photos were already discussed here, or certainly elsewhere on Web, and I don't know that they even have much meaning for today -- IBWOs being around in the 50s, 60s, 70s, doesn't necessarily have bearing on their existence in 2007, unless you're convinced the bird couldn't have made it past the 40s. To my eye the bird in question is a PIWO, and there's too much info not known about the photos and photographer; having said that, someone once explained to me how to interpret the photo (how to look at the details/markings) to see it as an IBWO, and indeed if you accepted that interpretation than yes, an IBWO might be likely (from the bill, saddleback, and dorsal area).
BTW, as far as reports of perched birds go, just to be technical, I feel compelled to say there ARE many other reports of possible perched IBWOs, but they come from individuals of such weak or unknown credibility that they don't get widespread mention in the literature, but it wouldn't be accurate to say such reports don't exist. Again, the reports everyone focusses on are a tiny fraction of all the reports out there (maybe for good reason, maybe not).
I think you're making too much of these apparent contradictions. Some of them (the question of wariness, for example) were at issue in the earlier literature, so the questions long predate the current debate. None of them seem particularly surprising to me, given the scarcity of the bird (I don't think anyone's suggested there are more than 150, scattered over several states) and the very limited amount of data that's available. If a breeding population is located and further study becomes possible, I suspect that many of them will be resolved quite easily.
pcoin said:
IBWO_Agnostic
Well-known member
There's a good article here about observer bias:
http://elibrary.unm.edu/sora/Auk/v100n03/p0755-p0757.pdf
(and yes, I did see it first on Tom Nelson's site). But anyway, what I want to talk about birding alone and birding with someone else.
I'm generalizing here (and using my own experience). When you are with someone and you see a bird, you may not call it out right away if you can't ID it. You don't want to make a bad call and be embarassed. So you watch it quietly yourself, get confident of the ID and then call it out. If you are alone, however, and you see a bird quickly, you may guess an ID and the nice thing is, there is no one there to challenge it. You may have gotten it right or you may have gotten it wrong. No one will know. I've removed a couple birds from my life list that I saw solo, and years later realized that I really didn't see all the field marks necessary to lock down the ID.
Many of the recent (with 5 years) IBWO sightings have been by solo observers. (Maybe I have this wrong, but is the Gallagher/Harrison sighting the only one with multiple observers?). Why is that the case? If searchers are in pairs, they are less likely to call out an ID with a < 3 second view. If they are alone, they are more likely to later report an 'encounter'.
Another note, if you are birding with a better birder, you are even less likely to call out an ID if you are unsure, and you are less likely to disagree with the calls made by the better birder. We know that Gallagher is a more experienced birder than Harrison (note the compact binoculars around Harrison's neck in the early photos of his searching....experienced birders know that compacts are crap for birding). I'm sure Harrison would admit that he is less knowledgeable than Gallagher. So lets say Gallagher sees a weird PIWO or a PIWO that just doesn't fit his stereotype of a PIWO, he calls out IBWO, Harrison - who has been searching for years and REALLY WANTS an IBWO - defers to the expert and shouts out IBWO also. They build on each others crappy sighting (no dorsal stripes, no bill), and off we go. I think that is entirely plausible.
Someone should review all the 'encounters' reported, and add up the solo ones and the ones by more than one observer. The results would be telling I fear.
http://elibrary.unm.edu/sora/Auk/v100n03/p0755-p0757.pdf
(and yes, I did see it first on Tom Nelson's site). But anyway, what I want to talk about birding alone and birding with someone else.
I'm generalizing here (and using my own experience). When you are with someone and you see a bird, you may not call it out right away if you can't ID it. You don't want to make a bad call and be embarassed. So you watch it quietly yourself, get confident of the ID and then call it out. If you are alone, however, and you see a bird quickly, you may guess an ID and the nice thing is, there is no one there to challenge it. You may have gotten it right or you may have gotten it wrong. No one will know. I've removed a couple birds from my life list that I saw solo, and years later realized that I really didn't see all the field marks necessary to lock down the ID.
Many of the recent (with 5 years) IBWO sightings have been by solo observers. (Maybe I have this wrong, but is the Gallagher/Harrison sighting the only one with multiple observers?). Why is that the case? If searchers are in pairs, they are less likely to call out an ID with a < 3 second view. If they are alone, they are more likely to later report an 'encounter'.
Another note, if you are birding with a better birder, you are even less likely to call out an ID if you are unsure, and you are less likely to disagree with the calls made by the better birder. We know that Gallagher is a more experienced birder than Harrison (note the compact binoculars around Harrison's neck in the early photos of his searching....experienced birders know that compacts are crap for birding). I'm sure Harrison would admit that he is less knowledgeable than Gallagher. So lets say Gallagher sees a weird PIWO or a PIWO that just doesn't fit his stereotype of a PIWO, he calls out IBWO, Harrison - who has been searching for years and REALLY WANTS an IBWO - defers to the expert and shouts out IBWO also. They build on each others crappy sighting (no dorsal stripes, no bill), and off we go. I think that is entirely plausible.
Someone should review all the 'encounters' reported, and add up the solo ones and the ones by more than one observer. The results would be telling I fear.
Sidewinder
Well-known member
No, no, no... (I seldom use them but I've met other experienced birders in the U.S. who do; optics have gotten much better over time)IBWO_Agnostic said:
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IBWO_Agnostic
Well-known member
Sidewinder said:
Although this is not really on-topic, the field of view in compacts is still terrible for actually finding birds in a landscape. I'll agree that the optics are much better, it's that tiny field of view I have a problem with (I do wear glasses, so that is part of the problem).
Then again, I think many of the 'encounters' have been with the naked eye, so it's really a moot point.
Edward woodwood
Member
any experieced observers out there who would use compacts to go IBWO hunting in a dense swamp?
maybe in the glove box or as a standby emergency but as a first pair for a serious birder? you've got to be joking.
Tim
maybe in the glove box or as a standby emergency but as a first pair for a serious birder? you've got to be joking.
Tim
Ilya Maclean
charlatan
Sidewinder said:
Hmmm, not convinced but concede it does depend on what you define as compacts. Probably the best compacts on the market are the Swarovski 8 x 20s, which are fine as opera glasses or a day at the races, but rubbish for general birding, particularly in bad light (like in swamp forest). That said, I've used the Swarovski 8 x 30 SLCs (which are light-weight and I guess could class as compacts) in rainforests and these are great. Not as good as my 8.5 x 42 ELs though.
In general, compacts are not as good as wider lensed binoculars because they don't let as much light in. Their main advantage is a relief from sore necks and because of their light weight they are easier to hold steady and lift quickly. Almost every serious birder I know tends to use at least 8 x 30s though
IBWO_Agnostic
Well-known member
You elitist birders. So you have to have a thousand dollar pair of binoculars to see an Ivory-billed Woodpecker? The snobbery on this list is just disgusting. blah blah blah...
(I just thought I'd get there first and save ______________ <insert intrepid IBWO searcher here> the trouble).
(I just thought I'd get there first and save ______________ <insert intrepid IBWO searcher here> the trouble).
MacGillivray's Trout
Well-known member
Optics
My first pair of binoculars were compacts, and they were bad with a capital B and three Ds. And not the good kind of bad, either. I use 10x42s now.
I noticed there are no bids on the IBWO photograph available on eBay. I'm not bidding because I don't have $100 (and also I don't believe it). Why isn't someone else snatching it up, or don't y'all believe it either?
My first pair of binoculars were compacts, and they were bad with a capital B and three Ds. And not the good kind of bad, either. I use 10x42s now.
I noticed there are no bids on the IBWO photograph available on eBay. I'm not bidding because I don't have $100 (and also I don't believe it). Why isn't someone else snatching it up, or don't y'all believe it either?
choupique1
Well-known member
pcoin said:
Ilya Maclean
charlatan
choupique1 said:
No, but I might have missed them cos of all that camo gear and outdoor skill...
. Kind of reminds me of that joke about elephants painting the bottoms of their feet yellow to hide upside down in custard (have you ever seen an elephant in custard.......)Come to think of it and talking of circular arguments and all that, I wonder if there's certain parallels with IBWOs and wariness there.
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choupique1
Well-known member
Ilya Maclean said:No, but I might have missed them cos of all that camo gear and outdoor skill...
ilya turkey hunters are by far the most stealthy of all outdoorspeople - several i know ride mountain bikes in rather than atvs to get into the woods without making a lot of racket....
several turkey hunters in the pearl have had ibwo searchers walk right by them....
Ilya Maclean
charlatan
choupique1 said:
Did the searchers have compact binoculars?
MacGillivray's Trout said:
I am not going to bet $100 on the seller's authenticity and identification skills, but the seller now has a note saying that the buyer may inspect the photo (presumably in person) before paying. We'll see if anyone who lives near Fort Smith, Arkansas is tempted enough to pull the trigger!
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