[TN-Bird] Ivory bill evidence questioned/NY TIMES article

For those of you who are not registered with NY TIMES, here is the article 
we've been hearing about.

Dee Thompson
Nashville, TN
  
July 21, 2005


3 Biologists Question Evidence in Sighting of Rare Woodpecker

By ANDREW C. REVKIN
Three biologists are questioning the evidence used by a team of bird experts 
who made the electrifying claim in April that they had sighted an ivory-billed 
woodpecker, a bird presumed to have vanished from the United States more than 
60 years ago, in the swampy forests of southeast Arkansas. 

If the challenge holds up, it would undermine not only a scientific triumph - 
the rediscovery of a resplendent bird that had been exhaustively sought for 
years - but also significant new conservation expenditures in the region.

The paper questioning the discovery has been submitted to a peer-reviewed 
journal, which could post the analysis online within a few weeks. But the paper 
will be accompanied by a fierce rebuttal by the team that announced the 
discovery, and a response to that rebuttal by the challengers.

The expected publication of the paper and the rebuttal was confirmed in 
interviews and e-mail exchanges with two authors of the challenge, Richard O. 
Prum 
and Mark B. Robbins, ornithologists at Yale and the University of Kansas, as 
well as with two members of the team that reported finding the woodpecker. 

The third author of the new paper is Jerome A. Jackson, a zoologist at 
Florida Gulf Coast University and the author of the book, "In Search of the 
Ivory-Billed Woodpecker," published in 2004. 

"In my opinion," Mr. Jackson wrote in an e-mail message on Wednesday, "the 
data presented thus far do no more than suggest the possibility of the presence 
of an ivory-billed woodpecker. I am most certainly not saying that 
ivory-billed woodpeckers are not out there. I truly hope that the birds do 
exist in 
Arkansas or elsewhere and have been championing this idea for a long time."

Both groups of scientists declined to name the journal or to discuss the 
details of the challenge and the response until they were published.

But they made it clear that the debate revolves around four seconds of fuzzy 
videotape that, by chance, captured a bird with sweeping white-and-black wings 
as it darted from its perch on the far side of a tupelo tree in April 2004 
and flicked over swampy waters before vanishing in the trees 11 wing beats 
later. 

That video clip was just one piece in a pile of drawings, recordings and 
other evidence collected in more than a year of searching and deploying cameras 
and listening devices across the vast swampy reaches of the Cache River 
National 
Wildlife Refuge. 

Altogether, the original research team, led by scientists from Cornell 
University and the Nature Conservancy, compiled seven sightings, including the 
video, as well as recordings of a "double knock" sound typical of the 
ivory-billed 
bird. 

But only the video was potentially solid enough to confirm for the wider 
ornithological community the existence of the bird, the authors said in various 
statements at the time.

Everyone agrees that the bird that appears on the tape is either an 
ivory-billed woodpecker or a pileated woodpecker, a slightly smaller bird that 
is 
relatively common. Both species have a mix of white and black plumage. However, 
the 
ivory-billed woodpecker has a white trailing edge to its wings while the 
pileated woodpecker has a black trailing edge. 

The team that conducted the original search for the bird ran extensive tests, 
including recreating the scene captured in video using flapping, hand-held 
models of the two types of woodpecker. They concluded that the plumage patterns 
seen in the grainy image could only be that of the ivory-billed woodpecker. 

The authors of the new paper disagree. 

Only extended scientific discussion - or new pictures of the bird from 
additional searches - will determine whose view will prevail. Another intensive 
scientific search of the region is scheduled to begin in November, Cornell 
officials said. 

"The people who originally announced this thoroughly believe they got an 
ivory-billed woodpecker," Dr. Robbins said in an interview. Determining if a 
species has crossed the threshold of extinction often requires decades of 
observation to ensure that no stray individuals have found a reclusive 
hideaway. 

Supposedly extinct species have been rediscovered with some frequency over 
the last century. One famed example is the coelacanth, a fish known only from 
fossils for generations but then caught by African anglers.

In the case of the ivory-billed woodpecker, a magnificent bird with a 30-inch 
wingspan and a red crest, determining that it has not become extinct has 
proved equally daunting. Individual birds were widely dispersed, and the 
woodpecker shared habits and habitat with the pileated woodpecker. 

Van Remsen of Louisiana State University, an expert on the woodpecker and a 
member of the team that reported finding the ivory-billed species, said he 
remained confident of the discovery. 

"We can counter everything," he said. "We stick to our guns." 

The announcement of the bird's apparent discovery came on April 28, when the 
scientists' findings were published in the online version of the journal 
Science. 

The announcement thrilled conservationists, who saw the bird as the perfect 
symbol around which to build an invigorated protection plan for woodland 
habitat in the Southeast, which harbors a rich array of wildlife and plants. 

The Bush administration used the reported sightings in Arkansas to promote 
its "cooperative conservation" philosophy. The day the rediscovery was 
publicized, the administration announced a variety of initiatives, including a 
plan to 
pay more than $13 million to landowners within the region's floodplains who 
plant and maintain forests. 

John W. Fitzpatrick, the co-leader of the search for the bird and director of 
the Cornell University Laboratory of Ornithology, said it was normal for 
scientists to disagree about evidence of this sort, especially because in this 
case the video in question was "pretty crummy." 

But he said that extensive analysis was done and redone to eliminate the 
possibility that the bird was a pileated woodpecker. 

Dr. Fitzpatrick added that there was "significant additional evidence right 
now" that would be published in coming months. 

He declined to comment on the challengers' assertions, saying any discussion 
could jeopardize publication of the exchange of papers on the video.

Other related posts: