With the overall decline of many of the birds around us, it is satisfying to see that the largest of the remaining North American woodpeckers is able to adapt to a changing world, and will still be with us in the future. Whether you say "pill-eated" or "pile-eated," this woodpecker is still an impressive bird. While it now holds the distinction of being this country's largest woodpecker, this has not always been the case. The almost, or completely, extinct ivory-billed woodpecker was larger by around 3 inches. This species is now a legend; although, rumors of its continued existence still persist, especially in this part of the country.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Rumors still persist
A paragraph from this article about the Pileated Woodpecker:
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http://bbill.blogspot.com/
In related news, Bill Pulliam is still talking to himself.
I saw that over on Soggy Bill.
He's obsessed on turning that video into an IBWO by denying the obvious. That it's a Pileated!
I love how Bill's post has zero comments as yet.
Perhaps it's because he is making very sound interpretations that Sibley et al. continue to depend upon video artifacts and presuming things are there when they can't be seen. There really isn't much to rebut with his arguments. Though since it is not published, it doesn't officially add anything to the discussion either.
Bill is not getting comments because he doesn't allow anonymous comments. Kind of squelches things.
Perhaps it's because he is making very sound interpretations that Sibley et al. continue to depend upon video artifacts and presuming things are there when they can't be seen.
Seems kind of hard to swallow when the original Cornell analysis of the video interpreted artifacts that weren't even a bird as an Ivory-bill.
I do grant that the video is of such poor quality that it's hard to separate artifacts from facts, so to speak. Further analysis is a waste of time because Sibley, this blog, Doc Martin and many others have shown that it is perfectly reasonable to interpret it as a Pileated. Common sense, something sorely lacking in the debate, says that if it can be a common bird vs. a probably extinct or at best extremely rare bird, it's the common bird.
This week I've gotten several emails which have said that I either won some foreign lottery or that a Nigerian needs to get millions of dollars out of his country, and is willing to split it 50/50 with me. By applying some rules of common sense, I deleted them all. I don't need to prove they are scams. I'm willing to risk the loss of millions of dollars because I can recognize patterns and have a basic understanding of odds.
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