Bird Board
Possible Ivory Billed Woodpecker
Posted by Grover Larkins
about 5 years ago
6 Comments
Mile marker 185 on I-75 flew across interstate east bound.
Direct rowing flight reminded me of a crow or pintail (slower wingbeat). Lots of white in trailing edge of wing. Flight with neck extended and tail collapsed - not fanned out at all. 10 second view - distance 30 yards.
Should be checked out, habitat nearby includes Myakka River and lake.
Shocked the socks off of me!
Grover Larkins
Comments
Ok, seems no one is interested.
I don't have the time to look for it but this is the ONLY one I have seen since about 1964/5 when I saw a pair in South Miami.... Those I watched for 15 minutes as they shelled out a dead standing Dade County Pine tree just south of the playground at Sunset Elementary School. Literally I was a 6 year old watching them from perhaps 15 feet.... Monster big woodpeckers, only one had a red crest, one black -- both with loads of white underneath and on the back and with white beaks. Picked them out of a picture book line up for my dad... his comment was, I thought those were all gone.... Now he is too....
Grover
Grover,
Like you, I saw an Ivory-bill as a child. It was in Alabama, and I reported it to the National Audubon Society. They gently informed me that what I saw was probably a Pileated Woodpecker.
Hi! I am looking on google maps at that area, and am interesting indeed, especially as you have seen an Ivory Bill in the past. Sadly, I no longer live in that part of the world... But, one day, I will return, I will have this in mind, and will search this area for this bird.
Yes - that was the funny part, there was a couple of other confirmed sightings reported in that same area in one of the references I found, I believe in the FIU Library in the late 1980's early 1990's.
From the distance back in the 1960's that I saw them at there was zero chance of being mistaken. 15' is CLOSE!
Grover,
I saw an Ivory-billed Woodpecker near St. Martinville, Louisiana in 1958. I was 10. My father had been friends with George Lowery and bought "Louisiana Birds" the day it came out in 1955. My father was very interested in the ivory-billed because he had grown up in north Louisiana and had a few sightings when young. He got me interested, so I had studied the pictures. But he didn't believe me when I saw the bird.
In 2006, after hurricane Katrina had stripped the trees of leaves, I had 3 sightings of the bird. One in Mississippi and two in Honey Island Swamp in Louisiana.
The problem is people say, if the bird exists why hasn't anyone seen it, then when someone reports seeing the bird, people say, no you didn't.
Tanner was wrong. He said the bird isn't skittish. That is because he was led to an active nest. The birds weren't going to leave. He set up a blind there. He never found an ivory-billed on his own. Another error he made wss to say they needed old growth forest. Not true. Historical records show nest holes in trees with only a 15 inch diameter.
Is the Ivory-billed Woodpecker wary of people, yes. Do birders make a lot of noise in the woods, yes. Even when not speaking, just walking provides enough noise to scare birds and critters away. Example, there are bears in the woods here, but I've never seen one. Does that mean they are extinct or extrapated?
My experience is that the two I saw in the 1965/66 time were notably silent, making no calls whatsoever. They shelled out the dead pine with a minimum of muss and fuss, lots of bugs to eat, drilling not needed. When they left they did not call either. If they had not been "right there" in front of me I probably wouldn't have seen them.
Keep well and let's hope that there are still a few out there!
Grover Larkins
Leave a Comment