What I am sure of is that the ivorybills are there. Not one bird. Not a single pair. At least a half dozen pairs and perhaps tens of pairs of Ivory-billed Woodpeckers in the extensive swamp forests along the Choctawhatchee River. The Ivory-billed Woodpecker is not extinct. It isn't even hanging by a thread. It has a toehold in the forests on the Florida Panhandle.
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14 comments:
Yah sure!!! Can someone spell w-a-c-k-o ?
Cyberthrush actually is correct about that one. There is an entire colony of Ivory-bills in Florida. The catch is that they're in an alternate universe, another dimension (or perhaps dementia) if you will, and thus are very hard to detect in ours. It also makes taking photos harder.
What I am sure of is that the ivorybills are there. Not one bird. Not a single pair. At least a half dozen pairs and perhaps tens of pairs of Ivory-billed Woodpeckers in the extensive swamp forests along the Choctawhatchee River.
Ouch. That's going to haunt him for a long time to come. I guess we know where that sad claim of "at least nine pairs!" came from.
Obviously (even to believers) he has no evidence to back up that claim. Why can't people see that this isn't about science and evidence, it's about hopes and dreams???
Hill's book sounds absolutely laughable, and I spotted this quote on the cyberthrush's website:
"All truth passes through 3
stages: 1st it is ridiculed. 2nd,
it is violently opposed. 3rd,
it is accepted as self-evident."
-- Arthur Schopenhauer
But my dear Mr Cyberthrush, you must realize that being ridiculed is not ALWAYS a sign that you are right. Yes?
Cyberthrush says:
"..a number of interesting yarns related here.."
And do all those yarns and the tight-knit group of searchers result in a fabricated story that is used to pull the wool over the eyes of the public?
Saw this on the wall of a restaurant restroom in Brinkley:
"My mother made me a True Believer"
under it someone else wrote
"If I buy her the wool will she make me one too?"
Can the AOU revoke membership from folks who discredit the profession of ornithology to this degree? We're no longer talking cold fusion research. This is wearing tinfoil hats and sleeping in pyramids. Lunacy.
Dr. Hill will need to protect his book from the infestation of coprophagous beetles.
"They're in another dementia".
That's the best in a long time.
One thing is abundantly clear from Hill's statement. As far as he's concerned, all of his sound data are rock solid. He just KNOWS the calls and knocks are from IBWO. It is the only explanation for being able to come up with numbers like that.
I think he has become a bit untethered from reality.
"perhaps tens of pairs"
Not 20 birds, which would be "ten" of pairs.
Not 40 birds, which would be barely "tens of pairs" but 40 plus birds, as you'd have juveniles, etc. In that one area. Big, loud, noisy birds.
What really needs to happen is for prominent ornithologists to step forward and say in no uncertain terms "I don't believe you. Either get us a photo or retract your claims."
A saturation search effort would put an end to this, but it would be a negative ending, and they can't allow that to happen. Let's see, it took Elvis about 7 months or so to vanish from Arkansas. So, if we estimate 20-30 individuals in the Chockfullaibwoatchee, then we're looking at this continuing for another10-15 years before they can start saying that they must have died out....
A saturation search effort would put an end to this, but it would be a negative ending, and they can't allow that to happen.
Anon, you need to review excuse #2; "Too many searchers--IBWO scared off".
True believers, like Bobby Harrison, have this as a safety net for their beliefs. If you try hard with good coverage, you scare the birds away. If you try with just a few people, the birds will stay, but it will just take a really, really long time to find them. But they'll be found if you just keep giving us money!
"Send money or you'll be the one responsible for the extinction of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker!"
Geoff Hill, let me tell you how it is. I don't believe you. Either get us a photo or retract your claims.
Anon 6:40 wrote:
"Anon, you need to review excuse #2; "Too many searchers--IBWO scared off"."
True, true. But, in my defense, I then focused on excuses 12-13 (IBWO must have died).
Of course, the excuses are for IBWO Apologists. When I say "saturation search," the Apologists imagine dozens of searchers running amok in the woods like twits or gumbies. Heck, that probably WOULD scare off the IBWOs. But, actually, I'm talking about ringing an area with hundreds of observers and moving inward in a skirmish line, immediately after an "encounter" (so we KNOW the IBWO is there at that moment). Maybe even have some close air support. Maybe even have "drivers" banging trash can lids with sticks to flush the IBWOs towards an ambush of photographers. My ultimate point being that the Apologists don't want this to happen because they know that there won't be any IBWOs spotted.
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