An excerpt from this year's
schedule for the Alabama Coastal BirdFest:
After dinner, we'll hear a fascinating presentation about the search in Florida for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. Dr. Geoff Hill , ornithologist and Professor at Auburn University, has been leading a team through the swamps and backwaters of the Choctawhatchee River Basin on the Florida panhandle in search of this elusive bird. Recently, the team has discovered many large cavities and unique feeding trees, heard the distinctive kent calls or double raps on 41 occasions, and observed Ivorybills 14 times, according to Dr. Hill. Research is continuing. Come hear his exciting first-hand stories.
A related paragraph is
here:
"We know that Dr. Hill and his team have heard the birds' distinctive calls and seen evidence of nests and feeding, and we hope they will have some conclusive proof by October, but in any event, he will have fascinating stories to tell about the search," Morley said. "Who would have guessed that this elusive bird could be living so close to us here on the Gulf Coast?"
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3 comments:
Hill reminds me of Professor Behe and intelligent design. He's just going to follow this ridiculousness down to a career ending whimper.
Speaking of Hill you might want to see this.
http://www.3rbc.org/
Recently, the team has discovered many large cavities
A-holes? Wasn't the concept of unique cavities debunked by remote cameras?
and unique feeding trees,
Wasn't the "unique" bark scaling actually debunked by Cornell? I seem to remember that remote cameras proved that scaling thought to be unique to Ivory-billed was actually created by Pileateds. Anybody remember the reference?
heard the distinctive kent calls or double raps on 41 occasions,
Trashed and trashed, repeatedly. Sonograms of his kents don't match the only known kent calls. Double raps have been attributable to multiple sources.
Dr. Hill, you must first prove that these new kent calls (that don't match known calls) are actually coming from Ivory-billeds. Then you can talk about your "detections". You're putting the cart before the horse, which is very bad science.
and observed Ivorybills 14 times,
For a grand total of about 22 seconds or so. How convincing.
according to Dr. Hill.
Uh, yeah. Dr. Hill doesn't seem to let negative reinforcement slow him down in the least. Has he ever published any data that actually doesn't support his hypothesis? Or is that type of thing just kept under the rug?
I used to support the statement that Geoff Hill made that the evidence wasn't solid, but after reading multiple public statements like this, I think he's being rather two-faced. One face is shown to expert birders and scientists, and appears objective. The other is shown to a more general public, and is pure cheerleader. I don't trust people like that.
I'll be interested in a report on his talks and papers at AOU.
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