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[TN-Bird] Fw: [TEXBIRDS] IBWO Implications for Texas - Part 2
- From: "K.D. Breault" <KBreault@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "tn-bird" <tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 9 Jul 2005 12:31:01 -0500
This might be of considerable interest to tn-birders.
Kevin Breault
Brentwood, TN
Williamson County
----- Original Message -----
From: "Collins, Fred (Commissioner Pct. 3)" <fred_collins@xxxxxxxx>
To: <TEXBIRDS@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, July 08, 2005 2:43 PM
Subject: [TEXBIRDS] IBWO Implications for Texas - Part 2
---> Texbird help file http://www.texbirds.org <---
Implications for Texas
Tanner visited Texas in 1938. He visited sites from which he had received
recent sighting reports. Those four sites were Sulfur River Bottoms, Cass
Co., Caddo Lake, Harrison and Marion Cos., Big Thicket, Polk, Hardin, and
Tyler Cos., and Bunn's Bluff vicinity, Orange Co. He dismissed all areas
as
cutover and of poor quality for Ivorybills and he assumed all sightings to
be misidentified Pileated Woodpeckers. So began the dismissal of all
subsequent Texas reports.
In Tanner's defense, he was looking for another "Singer Tract". A large
contiguous tract of virgin timber that may have had a few extra pair of
Ivorybills packed in from recently cleared neighboring woods. He was not
keyed into finding a few nomadic pair passing through. I think the idea
Tanner put forth that Ivory-bills were more common at the Singer Tract due
to an influx of birds from nearby recently cleared areas is significant.
I
think that the flurry of sightings in the Big Thicket in the mid 1960s
was
a result of the logging and flooding of Lake Sam Rayburn in December
1965.
The idea being that the population from that major bottomland forest
became
the extra pair or two of birds that could not penetrate existing
territories in existing good habitat blocks and these displaced birds
moved
from place to place and produced many sight reports. Hence, the birds at
a
limited amount of habitat in the Sternberg Tract, where they were observed
repeatedly and audio recorded by John Dennis in 1969.
Regardless what we had in 1938 when Tanner dismissed Texas or what John
Dennis thought were in Texas in 1969 or what I thought in 1970, the real
question is: Do we have any Ivory-billed Woodpeckers in 2005?
Based on the few preliminary reports I have received since the Arkansas
sightings, I think there is a high probability that we do. With the help
of
Bill Holliday using GIS technology we have looked into what habitat is
available for the species if it were in the state. I was astounded by
what
Bill found. Although highly imperiled by channelization projects, dam
projects, timber harvest activities, recreational property development
and
other development pressures, bottomlands are still sufficient to hold the
species in East Texas.
The fact is that because of preservation efforts in the 1960s and 70s
there
is now a substantial area of maturing trees of 70 or more years in age.
Trees large enough for Ivorybills are now fairly common in many preserved
tracts. These properties often border or include bottomland forest and
together form sizeable blocks forest habitat, which are likely to continue
to improve. I believe that a small surviving population may actually be
expanding and a result of that might be a single wandering male in less
than optimal areas in Arkansas. This bird in Arkansas may well have been
born in Louisiana or even Texas and found its way to a "sweet spot" among
improving habitat in Arkansas. He may be wandering widely looking for a
new
young mate. If that speculation is correct, we can expect more wandering
birds in "unlikely" places. The Ivorybill has certainly become an East
Texas anywhere, anytime type of lifer.
There will be many miss identifications to tract down. Birds reported from
backyards can for the most part be discounted without further
consideration
although sometimes they defy logic. In the 70s there was a partially
albino
Pileated Woodpecker that was very much patterned like an Ivorybill. It
required a visit. Already since the Arkansas sighting another bird like
this
has been reported in Baytown. Fortunately with the use of Internet
birdcalls, this Baytown bird was identified as a Pileated without a trip
to
the home. These birds demonstrate that plumage alone will not assure you
that you are tracking an Ivorybill. Calls are not a sure bet either. One
of
the searchers, Guy Luneau, brother of David Luneau, the man that took the
Arkansas video, lives in Kilgore Texas. His wife is the real avid birder
in
the family and they bird their home property and nearby area often. His
wife was one of the fortunate ones to actually see the Arkansas bird.
They
have heard the Ivorybill call at their home in Kilgore! Oops, it was a
Blue
Jay. Heard and unseen will only make you have sleepless nights and infect
you with the search bug. That bug will lead you to some pretty strange
places at times.
Of course the question is why is a Blue Jay imitating an Ivory-billed
Woodpecker in Texas in 2005? Have they heard one call recently? Or is the
Blue Jay from the Chase River in Arkansas? Others have told me about
hearing an Ivory-billed Woodpecker call in East Texas within the last 10
years. Even if only an imitation, it seems to deserve some thought and
maybe
some time searching nearby habitat. Wouldn't you like to see what those
Blue Jays are imitating. The single bird in Arkansas has seldom been
heard
calling. I think about times when my wife is not home, how I might go
hours
before I eventually speak to a dog or pet bird. And I am not concerned
about
letting a potential predator know my where-a-bouts. Without a partner, a
single wandering Ivorybill might be a very quiet bird. Getting a
recording
of an Ivory-billed may be as or more difficult than a photograph.
The most likely thing for a search effort to find is evidence of
Ivory-billed Woodpeckers scaling recently dead trees with very tight
bark.
Tanner reported and photographed such scaling works in the Singer Tract
in
the 30s. My 1970 paper includes information about workings at the
Sternberg
Tract, now part of the Kirby Nature Trail in the Big Thicket National
Park.
These workings are well described as recently dead trees with very tight
bark that is scaled off with strong blows from the birds' bills at an
obtuse angle. It produces a mark in the wood of the tree (that Dennis
compared to the skulls and bills of both Ivory-billed and Pileated
Woodpeckers in the case of the 1970 photos) and might be best imitated by
taking a screwdriver or chisel and striking it under the bark of a tree
and
then prying away the bark. I will have this article posted on the HAS web
site and post scans of the original color slides from the Sternberg Tract
that were reproduced as a black and white print in my 1970 paper.
The workings at the Sternberg tract were primarily on Sweetgum; the
extensive workings all on Sweetgums. Tanner's study found they most often
used Sweetgum and Nuttall's Oak in the Singer Tract. The birds used these
trees far more than the trees composition of the forest. Tanner studied
the
tree use and found they preferred larger trees 12-36 inches DBH but less
so
very large trees over 36 inches in diameter. He found Ivory-billed spent
almost 50% of their time feeding on trees from 12-24 inches BDH even
though
this size tree only composed 18% of all trees at the site. Large
Sweetgums
are prime habitat for Ivory-billed Woodpeckers and they are relatively
fast
growing trees often encountered at forest edges. Birders keying in on this
tree species and keeping an eye for scaling might help find the sites
with
the best potential for success.
I have received e-mail from several of the successful and unsuccessful
members of the Arkansas search team. They have given us some advice about
searching for the Ivorybill in Texas. They remind me that they have spent
100,000 man-hours in only about 8,000 acres. Most of the time was spent
in
5,000 acres. Success requires patience and a lot of time. The single male
they were trying to observe was extremely wary and skittish. They
recommended dressing in full camouflage and working more like a spring
turkey hunter than a birder. They recommend keeping a video camera
running
at all times to catch the flushing bird or the occasional call. They have
been searching mostly from canoe or kayak. Seeing a bird from that
vantage
point provides quiet approach, and open fields of view. It often
precludes
moving quickly to alter a view or following a crossing bird.
Many of the 1960s Texas sightings were by folks canoeing on Village Mill
Creek and Pine Island Bayou. Those observations would be similar to what
the Arkansas team is finding. Today, these two watercourses have far less
habitat than the nearby Neches River, which was likely the source of the
Pine Island and Village Mills' birds. Much of the Neches River is
currently
accessible by canoe or kayak and a good web site can show you the way.
http://www.digitaltexas.com/cdps/cditem.cfm?nid=19452 Floating that river
allows access to perhaps the last stronghold for the Ivorybill Woodpecker
in Texas. I will personally bet you a dollar that if you spend 100,000
hours floating the Neches River that you will see an Ivory-billed
Woodpecker. Of course, I must still be living for you to collect. I warn
you
that I am over 50. A normal 40 hour work year is 1940 hours in case you
were wondering. I will also guarantee you that you are far more likely to
see it canoeing the Neches rather than sitting at your computer reading
this.
Texas and Texans are involved with the effort to find and conserve this
relic of the nation's southeast wilderness. Cliff Shackelford of Texas
Parks and Wildlife has been appointed to the Biology Committee of the
Federal Recovery Team. Cliff is stationed in Austin. Jim Neal of the US
Fish and Wildlife Service has been appointed to the Habitat Committee. He
is
a bottomland forest expert and is stationed in Nacogdoches. The Gulf
Coast
Bird Observatory (GCBO) has a grant request to conduct a two-year
systematic search of the best habitat in Texas. Hopefully they will be
successful in getting the effort funded. There effort will be lead by John
Arvin who is stationed in Lake Jackson. In the area of habitat
conservation, I will personally advocate for the area above Lake
Steinhagen
transferred from the Army Corps of Engineers to a permanently preserved
status. It is currently leased to TPWD as a wildlife management and
scientific area. That status can be changed at any time and preservation
should be permanent. I hope many others will join my efforts. A field trip
to the area will be planned for February 2006 to show more people the
virgin
forest found at the site and its value to many of Texas' threatened and
endangered species. This trip will have significant cost due to the
logistics of the trip and also to help fund other Ivorybill related
efforts.
That field trip will hopefully be sponsored by HAS, GBCO and perhaps other
interested Texas groups. As chairmen of the HAS Citizen Science
Committee,
I am exploring a partnership with the GCBO in their grant request and to
assist as possible with in-kind services and other support of their
efforts.
Not all the Ivorybill sightings in Arkansas have been deep in the swamp by
stealth camouflaged "official" observers. Guy Luneau told me that his
wife's best sighting (she is an official Arkansas Team member) was in the
parking lot of the public canoe launch area. He missed it. He was parking
the car while his wife waited next to the canoe; the bird flew over the
parking lot in clear and plain view! I can see an Ivorybill being
reported
from almost any Big Thicket National Park Unit, from Martin Dies State
Park, or from the Trinity River Bottoms National Wildlife Refuge. The
more
aggregate hours the Texas birding community spends in the habitat
watching,
the more likely the chance of sightings. And repeated sightings may lead
to
"The Place" where the species lives and breeds. It is that "place" that
we
all longed to be found. For there is a chance, that someday in Texas'
"Big
Woods", we will see what no one has seen since Tanner, a fledgling
Ivory-bill!
Fred Collins
HAS Board
Waller, Texas
For answers to questions about this list, as well as current Texas
Birding Links, visit the Texbirds Reference Page at
http://www.texbirds.org
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