# Confirmed: Ivory-billed woodpecker isn't extinct



## victor mi pro bowhunter

That awesome what a great thing this is. Hopefully we will find out about more things we thout where long gone


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## snaggs

They thought BILL CLINTON was EXTINCT.....Until one day he once again Appeared. Seems Arkansas has a way with creatures:lol: :lol: 

FIND A PLACE THAT MAKES YOU HAPPY.....AND GO THERE.....OFTEN


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## Hamilton Reef

Reward Offered For Ivory-Billed Woodpecker

http://www.todaysthv.com/news/news.aspx?storyid=30216

Arkansas wildlife officials hope the offer of a $10,000 reward will help prove that the once-extinct ivory-billed woodpecker is living in the bayous of eastern Arkansas. 

Officials from The Nature Conservancy and the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission have announced a proposal that would give $10,000 to anyone who provides information that leads biologists to an ivory-billed woodpecker's nest, roost cavity or feeding site. 

The Nature Conservancy received a $10,000 anonymous donation for the reward. 

Biologists will only pursue reports that include a photograph, sound recording or other substantive evidence, Mueller said. 

The woodpecker was first spotted in the Cache River Wildlife Management Area in 2004 -- 60 years after it had last been seen.


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## otown

Hey HR,
Thanks for all your updates on this thread. I'm hoping against hope that the're stiil out there, but what's your gut feeling?
My best friend, besides my wife and sons, swears up and down he saw one in S. FL in the Everglades about 20 years ago. He's a world renowned horse surgeon, raised 5 boys along with my 3 to be Eagle Scouts with all the outdoors stuff that goes with that, can't spell anything that isn't a 15 letter Latin medical term and is a liar of epic proportions when it comes to fishing and hunting stories.
I tried to get him to admit they were pileated and he just made a stupid call and I showed him a pileated nest we have and cherish on our property. He knows the difference. (They raised 2 youngun's last year)
I work with a bunch of educated Cubans and several of them are from the really wild and uninhabited west end of Cuba. 2 of them claim to have seen an Ivory. Since one is a zoologist and the other a gynecologist, I hesitate to venture a guess on what they saw, enough said except I trust their integrity.
I'm a bit troubled by this 'reward' thing and hope some cracker doesn't show up with a carcass.
Thanks again for the update.

o town


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## Hamilton Reef

What's my gut feeling? Well, I'm always pleased with good news and in this case I was as excited as the rest of the birding community. But, as this long period of time extends on without a second and third confirmation sighting, my gut feeling is the possibility of misidentification. I'm still holding out hope for another positive sighting as long as possible.


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## Hamilton Reef

Woodpecker Halts Arkansas Irrigation Project

http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=10910

July 21, 2006  By Andrew DeMillo

LITTLE ROCK, Ark.  A federal judge halted a $320 million irrigation project Thursday for fear it could disturb the habitat of a woodpecker that may or may not be extinct. 

The dispute involves the ivory-billed woodpecker. The last confirmed sighting of the bird in North America was in 1944, and scientists had thought the species was extinct until 2004, when a kayaker claimed to have spotted one in the area. But scientists have been unable to confirm the sighting. 

Still, U.S. District Judge William R. Wilson said that for purposes of the lawsuit brought by environmental groups, he had to assume the woodpecker exists in the area. And he ruled that federal agencies may have violated the Endangered Species Act by not studying the risks fully. 

"When an endangered species is allegedly jeopardized, the balance of hardships and public interest tips in favor of the protected species. Here there is evidence" that the ivory-billed woodpecker may be jeopardized, he said. 

The National Wildlife Federation and the Arkansas Wildlife Federation had sued the Army Corps of Engineers, arguing that the project to build a pumping station that would draw water from the White River would kill trees that house the birds and that noise from the station would cause the woodpeckers stress. 

The judge said the Corps and the Interior Department must conduct further studies before proceeding. 

The Corps began building the Grand Prairie Irrigation Project last year, about 14 miles from where the bird was supposedly spotted. It suspended work in mid-March to keep from exceeding its budget and is scheduled to resume construction in October with the start of a new fiscal year. 

About $80 million has been spent so far. The project is scheduled to begin delivering water to farmers in 2010 or 2011. 

The kayaker's claim to have seen an ivory-billed woodpecker in the woods near the White River caused a sensation in scientific circles. But more than 100 volunteers and researchers who spent weeks last winter trying to find conclusive evidence of the bird's existence came back empty-handed. 

The Corps had conducted a study showing the project would not significantly harm the woodpecker's habitat, but environmental groups said the study was too narrow. 

Under the judge's order, the agencies must evaluate any ivory-bill nests and forage sites within 2 1/2 miles of the construction project. 

The pumping station would draw 158 billion gallons from the White River per year. Authorities said it is needed because the main aquifer beneath eastern Arkansas's soybean, cotton and rice fields is running out of water and could run out by 2015, causing economic hardship. 

A Justice Department lawyer said this year that a one-month delay would cost the Corps as much as $264,000, and a six-month wait $3 million.


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## otown

Wish I could tell you all that we have spotted a nesting pair or even a single but it hasn't happened.
Hope my gut feeling that they're gone is proven wrong.

o town


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## Hamilton Reef

NASA Joins Search for Elusive Woodpecker

http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=11003

August 04, 2006  By Reuters

WASHINGTON  NASA scientists have joined the search for the elusive ivory-billed woodpecker, long thought to be extinct but recently sighted in Arkansas. 

NASA used a laser-equipped research aircraft to fly over the Big Woods area of the Mississippi Delta to learn more about the big woodpecker's potential habitat, the U.S. space agency said Thursday. 

Scientists from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center and the University of Maryland used an instrument that sends pulses of energy to Earth's surface, where light particles from the lasers bounce off leaves, branches and the ground and reflect back to the instrument. 

These signals give scientists a direct measurement of the height of the forest's leaf-covered treetops, the ground level below and everything in between, NASA said in a statement. 

"We're trying to understand the environment where these birds live or used to live," said Woody Turner, a NASA scientist. Knowing the thickness of ground vegetation, the density of tree leaves and other factors including closeness to water and age of the forest might help in the search, he said. 

NASA's aerial effort is part of a quest that began in 2004 after a kayaker reported spotting the woodpecker along the Cache River in Arkansas. Before that, there had been no confirmed sightings of ivory-bills for half a century. 

Bird experts have searched on the ground, looking for nesting spots, leaving remote-controlled cameras and audio recorders in places that seem likely habitats for the woodpecker. But so far they have captured no confirmed images or sound recordings of the creature. 

In 2005, researchers published a report in the journal Science that at least one male ivory-bill still survived, but this finding has been challenged. 

The NASA-University of Maryland project aims to give detailed information about the bird's habitat to searchers on the ground, who can use it starting this fall to look for new evidence of the ivory-billed woodpecker's possible survival. 

More information and images are available online at http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/news/topstory/2006/woodpecker.html.


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## Hamilton Reef

In search of . . .
Lapeer native hunts extinct' ivory-billed woodpecker 

http://www.mlive.com/outdoors/flintjournal/index.ssf?/base/sports-1/1176387616286290.xml&coll=5

04/12/07 By Elizabeth Shaw [email protected]  810.766.6311

It's been called the last unicorn. Bigfoot. A red-headed Elvis.

It is the "golden egg" of every birder's dreams - and the poster child for extinctions wrought by man. 

Over the past 100 years, the elusive, ivory-billed woodpecker has been lost and found, again and again. Even today, no one can agree if the ivory-billed woodpecker truly is extinct - or if some unseen pairs survive, deep in the bayous and hardwood bottomlands of the southeastern U.S.In 2004, multiple sightings and a grainy video led to an announcement the ivory-billed had been rediscovered. Those findings since have been deemed inconclusive by the majority of scientists. 

In April 2005, Lapeer native Caleb Putnam spent two weeks trying to help solve the mystery as part of an annual search team from the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. 

Every day, the camo-clad Putnam left camp at sunrise and returned at sundown, paddling a canoe through the wet, swampy tangle of giant bald cypress and tupelo trees deep within the Cache River National Wildlife Refuge in Arkansas. 

"The old growth trees are very extensive and hard to get through. The canoe constantly tripped up on the cypress knees," said Putnam, 29. "It's the kind of place you don't want to go in without a GPS unit and maps, or you'll never find your way back out." 

Some days, he would sit in one spot and wait, listening intently for the ivory-billed's trademark call or double knock. Other days, he paddled in search of telltale signs: massive tree cavities, scaled bark, a feather or bit of egg, a flash of white-edged wing. 

Nothing. 

"I saw a couple cavities that looked consistent, but the problem here is that's not good enough to resurrect a species from extinction. We have to provide conclusive photos and other evidence," he said. 

"But I was so enthralled just to say I am at a place in a deep, dark swamp where I don't know if this bird exists or not, but I might actually have the chance to see one. It was living out a dream."

A birder's beginnings 

Putnam's search actually began when he was a small boy growing up in Lapeer. 

His father, Davison High School varsity football coach Jeff Putnam, brought home a feeder and identification book for the family backyard. Young Caleb was hooked instantly. 

"I started flipping through the book and watching all these stunningly gorgeous birds and it just connected," said Putnam. "It took me awhile to figure out I wasn't going to see all the birds in the book if I just waited there, that I needed to be out in the grasslands and woods." 

Today, he is the National Audubon Society's Michigan coordinator for the Important Bird Areas program, a global effort to identify and protect sites crucial to the survival of various bird species. 

And he has never quit searching for his next rare bird. 

"It's an Easter egg hunt for grownups. Every now and then, you find a golden egg and, when that happens, it's as exciting as it gets." 

His personal best golden egg appeared when he wasn't even looking: a rare, black-throated gray warbler, perched in a tree outside his Grand Rapids office. 

"This bird is so rare, it's only been seen five times in history. For this bird to have landed in the one tree in the world where I could've seen it seems so unlikely," he said. 

The ivory-billed is the ultimate golden egg, he said.

"You could compare it to the search for the unicorn or Bigfoot. That's why it's called Elvis by many on the Cornell team - you don't know if it's real or if it's a bunch of people who make him real because you want him to be real." 

Putnam said he's cautiously optimistic that researchers will one day confirm the bird's existence. 

"I think the only way I can honestly answer that is that I don't know. The bird could exist in very low numbers and be extremely difficult to find. But if it's present in any significant number with multiple breeding pairs, then I think it probably will be found." 

More important is what the bird represents, he said. 

"It's the flagship for the greater cause of extinction. This was a spectacular, stunning animal and we cut the forest out from beneath them. There's not a greater example for a rallying cry to prevent further extinctions. 

"It symbolizes hope, the resiliency of nature to withstand us humans. The thought it might still be around is just awe-inspiring." 

And, if it truly has gone the way of the dodo? 

"We need people to be aware of extinction risks. It's a real threat we're experiencing today, and it's important we're taking measures to see this doesn't happen again."


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## Hamilton Reef

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Release $27M Draft Recovery Plan for Ivory-Billed Woodpecker

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. -- Federal wildlife officials say spending more than $27 million to research the suspected habitat of the ivory-billed woodpecker is worth the cost, despite conflicting views on whether the elusive bird even exists.

The agency this week released a 185-page draft plan aimed at preventing the extinction of the bird. The draft plan, which is open for public comment until Oct. 22, recommends spending more than $27 million in federal dollars on recovery efforts for the woodpecker.

http://www.enn.com/top_stories/article/22262

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