If CLO had been legally allowed to use shotguns, this entire discussion might have been resolved by now.Hey Curtis--in your estimation, specifically which CLO searcher(s) possess the ability to wingshoot an "Ivory-bill", given a 100-meter, three-flap glimpse?
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This gets at a very common misconception among folks who are aware of the "rediscovery" and the evidence but haven't necessarily read the Science paper or any other descriptions of the event.
The general impression among people I've spoken with is that the Cornell folks were on their boat when they heard the "distinctive knocking sound." And then they looked around and one of them said, "Lord God! Is it ...? Could it be ...?" And he pointed to a magnificent bird about fifty feet away.
"Quick -- the video!!! The video!!!" The video dude grabs his gear and gets into action, capturing the bird just as it flies away.
The "researchers" then sit in their boat, weeping over the magnificence of what they saw, and popping champagne bottles all around.
All this yak yak is just pollution
Every problem has a solution
From my many days in Vietnam
With enemy hid in the sago palm
It was not the bomb or the gun
That put our quarry in the sun
In southern swamps where he is heard
Agent Orange will bare that bird
Humans! First, you put a bounty on one of your gods. Now you want to shoot one?
Please be advised that our invasion has been called off. We want to live in peace.
PLEASE!!!
Kneep.....kneep....
Amy wrote:
"Quick -- the video!!! The video!!!" The video dude grabs his gear and gets into action, capturing the bird just as it flies away.
The "researchers" then sit in their boat, weeping over the magnificence of what they saw, and popping champagne bottles all around.
Dear Amy-
Actually, that's exactly what happened, except that they were also firing their shotguns into the air while they were drinking the champagne..
Seriously, though, you probably know all this by now, but it was actually the canoe that accidentally got the video. I don't think it's been brought up lately (or maybe not at all) but if you've ever seen the original version of the Luneau video, neither of the canoe occupants actually sees the woodpecker when it flushes. Maybe Luneau (in the stern and actually facing towards the bird) eventually glimpses the bird as it disappears at some distance. The brother-in-law in the bow obviously never sees the bird at all, although, when he was debriefed by his Cornell handlers (as in "interrogated," not as in "his pants were removed"), he testified that not only had he seen the bird, he saw red on the crest (so it was a male). Maybe he was interviewed by a psychic while under hypnosis?
Ah, the wonders of hindsight!
I was just at a Luneau presentation at a local Audubon chapter. He (Luneau) stated rather defensively that the fellow in the front of the boat DID see the bird. But when you see the video NOT zoomed in on the bird, it is clear that the brother-in-law(?) does not see the bird. The hand in the zoomed in video stays on the boat paddle the entire time that the bird is flying.
I would have been grabbing for my binocs. Clearly, the story just has changed for the "better" as time went on.
That is the "road to fraud" that Tom often mentions. It's not a decoy nailed to a tree. It's the gradual migration of the story to bolster the "facts".
Shame.
P.S.-go "kneep" yourself, alien.
Yes, the hand on the canoe paddle...
When I first heard about the rediscovery I didn't cry...that's what fighting back tears is all about. I checked out the Cornell web site and was mildly impressed by inter-agency cooperation as well as vaguely troubled by the video. It didn't seem to me that the guy in the front of the boat had seen the bird. All we could see was his hand, but I was sure he'd missed it.
For some reason it seemed important to me to register my doubt that same day, so I left a question on a local birding listserve. Anyone know about the circumstances surrounding the video? Did the guy in the front of the boat actually see the bird? A local Audubon staffer didn't like where my question was leading and asked if I thought the moon landing was faked too.
Faked... well I guess that had crossed my mind, so I asked myself how many insiders would it take to perpetrate a hoax on this scale? I soon came to suspect it would involve more players than could be reasonably managed and I became a lukewarm believer on that basis alone.
I didn't give the evidence a lot more thought in the next few months except during a trip to remote northern Ontario. I was sitting on a spit of land between three lakes listening to Blue Jays in every direction. I was stunned by the variety of voices in a sampling of just a dozen or so local birds.
In the fall I seriously looked at Luneau for the first time and I immediately saw the answer to my question. How many insiders?...none. No hoax, no faked moon landing... just an honest mistake among a few enthusiastic observers and a little misplaced objectivity.
The silly hand on the paddle is what got me into this thing.
p.d. ann arbor
Has anyone looked into the possibility Cornell used shotguns on some of the remaining ivorybills in the Singer Tract in the 1940's when they saw the habitat was being destroyed????
Personally, I've always believed -- "If you can't identify it, then by all means, Audubon it.... In other words - ground check it."
If I may quote JJA here " I was in the woods, the woods of Louisiana and my heart was beating with joy. I called it few when I shot less than 100 per day."
Seriously, I'm the last person on earth who will tell you that ivorybills do not exist. However, I think making claims on fleeting glimpses based on one field identification character is total absurdity!!
Nature provides us with color aberrations in nearly all species. I remember we had a pileated with a white bill on the north Tensas River back around 1986. When you first saw it, you thought My God It's an Ivorybill! Closer inspection revealed it was a pileated woodpecker with a white bill.
A similar bird was present in the Dead Lake region to the west in the 70's and early 80's.
Just food for thought....
Bona Ditto
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