On August 16, 1941, at about 5:30 P.M. ... I was attracted by a most unusual noise. I immediately stopped the car and noticed two Ivory-billed Woodpeckers perched in two small ash trees about eight inches in diameter, having recently killed tops. Only one of the birds was carefully observed. A bright, white bill, flaming red crest, and large white wing patch were all clearly noted as the bird remained at the tree. The second bird in a similar ash tree was observed less carefully but a white dagger like bill was as clearly seen...
...As cutting and settlement proceeds and spreads to the more remote areas, the Ivory-bill will undoubtedly become completely extinct as a result of the destruction of its habitat...
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
"A bright, white bill"
A reader sent me these excerpts from an article by George H. Bick in the July, 1942 edition (PDF format) of The Auk. The bold font is mine:
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6 comments:
You know, until April 28th 2005, the IBWO hadn't crossed my mind in decades.
Then CLO did their thing.
This article is painful, simply painful.
Tom’s blog as translated by Babel Fish’s English to Shakespeare translator
Love Belabors the Lost
For thou fairest readers dost I recap
If thou willest just shortly shut yor yap
First dost the fair Sparling seeist
Then doth the less fairest Tom doubtest
But doth our fair story endeth?
Are you an idiot or whateth?
Of course our tale of woe be just beginning
Pay attention stout lad. Quit feigning!
It be now that our tale becomes dark
The evil empire of Ithaca is stark
Oh! All their words are bright and bonny
Into this they do chant “hey nonny nonny”.
But O take those lips away
And their dark hearts hold sway
They murder and murder that bird I say
With their incantations of Science’s pay day
Our tale doth brighten
Into a fairy tale come knighten
Our tale spinneth to the fair Birdmaiden
Whose cavity was found in a pretty garden.
She leapt and sloshed her way to tall castle
Of a tree. She be not merely a vassal
Of the evil Ithaca king who hath grown scarce
(give me a break! My tale is a farce.)
Lovely Birdmaiden took measure for measure
For you doth surely see. She hath found treasure.
And roundly she announced her find
In spite, forsuth, she would be maligned.
Far away fortunes of fair maiden in distress,
Attracted new strangers of planetary nobless
Who upon learning of our earthly delights
Took refuge here from their far away plights
Of woe and redemption our tale hath plenty
And clearly that cavity would be worth a twenty
But every good tale hath a moral for the masses
All’s well that ends with Quantum Entangled Gases.
Kudos! Alternate moral endings for our Shakespearean tale,
Don’t trust fair lasses?...
Earthlings be asses?....
Science gives passes?...
IBWOs require rose-colored classes?...
This story is progessing at the speed of molasses?...
The Second Annual Ivory-billed Woodpecker Summer Festival in Brinkley has changed its name to the "It Wasn't a Pileated" Summer Festival (IWAP vs. IBWO). Please stop by and buy your IWAP t-shirts, try a IWAP burger and get a IWAP haircut. Pay for it all with your new IWAP credit card (featuring a striking image of a bird that is not identifiable but is definitely not a Pileated). Then join us for a trip through the swamps where you will actually be able to observe for yourself birds that are not Pileateds – just like famous ornithologists do.
Love the poem, you are a poet laureate; please explain Quantum Entangled Gases
Quantum Entangled Gases - A large group of molecules able to change together just at the split second before definitive indentification
Please see comments under Tom's "Lord God, What a Mess" post.
This blog definitely needs an index!
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