April 28, 2005 There are lots of happy and ecstatic birders around with the news of the Arkansas Ivory-billed Woodpecker but it also could be the start of a long down hill plunge into despair, at least for me. If this bird does turn out to be just a lone bird, we will have to watch it slowly age and disappear from this earth as a species for a second time in a 100 years. Hopefully, if that is the case, it will do so undisturbed and in the wild and not suffer the fate of Martha the Passenger Pigeon, the last of her kind that passed from this earth while in captivity. It is a wake up call to us that we cannot allow the destruction or more fragmentation of the habitats we now have left on this small fragile planet. Maybe the bird was sent back to us as one last try to get our attention. It certainly has mine................. Good Birding!!! Jeff R. Wilson OL'COOT / TLBA Bartlett, TN =================NOTES TO SUBSCRIBER===================== The TN-Bird Net requires you to sign your messages with first and last name, city (town) and state abbreviation. ----------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------- To post to this mailing list, simply send email to: tn-bird@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx ----------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, send email to: tn-bird-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * TN-Bird Net is owned by the Tennessee Ornithological Society Neither the society(TOS) nor its moderator(s) endorse the views or opinions expressed by the members of this discussion group. Moderator: Wallace Coffey, Bristol, TN wallace@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Visit the Tennessee Ornithological Society web site at http://www.tnbirds.org * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Topographical Maps located at http://topozone.com/find.asp * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ========================================================