Extinct? I think not!

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greenfreak

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For 50 years the ivory-billed woodpecker has been widely considered extinct. But the Elvis of the bird-watching world is alive in eastern Arkansas, bird experts announced today.

The bird's disappearance coincided with extensive logging throughout the region, which continued up to the 1940s.

Hunting by professional collectors accelerated the extinction of remaining populations until the bird was given up as extinct. The last documented ivory-bill was seen over logged forestland in 1944.

Even if few breeding pairs survive in the Big Woods, the study team says that prospects for population growth look good. Additions to the public refuge system and habitat-restoration efforts are reestablishing the mature hardwood forests in the area.

Currently about a hundred thousand acres (40,470 hectares) of the Big Woods are protected and conserved, according to Scott Simon, director of the Nature Conservancy in Arkansas. There is a plan to conserve and restore an additional 200,000 acres (80,940 hectares) of critical habitat over the next ten years, Simon added.
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Entire article: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/04/0428_050428_extinctwoodpecker.html


These people at the conservancy are really really smart. When they first heard that they may have a presumed extinct bird, they said nothing. They quietly started purchasing more and more land around the area to ensure that it's habitat was undisturbed.

What happens with stuff like this is it draws scores of people to the site. Reporters, bird watchers, bird collectors, poachers, hunters... Since the bird is on the conservancy's land, they can control the crowds and ensure that the trees that these birds depend on remain there.

Pretty damn cool, methinks.
 
Last year I had a woodpecker outside my bedroom window. And every freaking morning he would peck the metal sign nailed to the tree out there. For hours and hours on end.

I was overjoyed this morning at dawn to find he's back.
 
Leslie said:
Last year I had a woodpecker outside my bedroom window. And every freaking morning he would peck the metal sign nailed to the tree out there. For hours and hours on end.

I was overjoyed this morning at dawn to find he's back.
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Woody Woodpecker recipe

4 cl Cachaca 15 cl Orange Juice 1 cl Galliano


Shake cachaca and juice with ice, and pour into a collins glass. Add galliano, and serve.


Serve in: Collins Glass
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So sue me. It was the best I could come up with on short notice. :p

Go here...
 
Leslie said:
Last year I had a woodpecker outside my bedroom window. And every freaking morning he would peck the metal sign nailed to the tree out there. For hours and hours on end.

I was overjoyed this morning at dawn to find he's back.
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What does the sign say? Why not pull it off the tree so he only pecks the wood?
 
The city owns the sign, I can't :(

It's a "No Motorized Vehicles" sign at the beginning of a bush.
 
When I was a kid, I lived in a cedar house, and we got a woodpecker one Spring who decided the house looked like a good tree and would go at one particular area. My dad got tired of waking up to his hammering right outside his bedroom window, so he covered the spot with a non-reflective metal plate.

You guessed it. The next morning, we ALL levitated off the matresses when the damn bird nailed the metal plate. Sounded like a freakin' machine gun.
 
Leslie, is the sign reflective? If so, he might be pecking at his reflection. Maybe you could rub some soap on it to remove the reflective spots and he'll stop coming back.
 
What I'm hearing is that what he's doing is finding the loudest thing around so he can attract a mate. He originally last year started on someone's eavestrough (those poor people lol), and ended up with the sign. I think I just gotta let nature take it's course and learn to get up really early.

It's a BAD way to wake up, but it really is kinda cute. I was happier when I realized what woke me up.
 
At the cottage, there are a lot of metal roofs, chimney caps, gutters, etc. Sons of bitches friggin compete every morning.
 
Leslie said:
What I'm hearing is that what he's doing is finding the loudest thing around so he can attract a mate.
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You're absolutely right.

Woodpeckers hammer to attract mates, to establish and/or defend a territory, to excavate nesting or roosting sites, and to search for insects.
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This looks like a great link to deter them: http://www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/natres/06516.html

Leslie, what does he look like? Black and white, like this little guy?:

downy_woodpecker2.jpg
 
Yep, that's him. He's the sweetest thing :D

He's not too fearful either. We can get fairly close before he flies off. But only to the next tree, he never strays far.
 
Does this mean that all the worlds critters can magically come back or just that eco-terrorists know shit about extinction? I don't see my wife. She must be extinct.
 
SULLIVAN, N.Y. (AP) — Car owners around town are covering their mirrors in an attempt to outsmart a woodpecker who apparently thinks his reflection is an enemy.

Tim Taylor, who owns Thruway Auto Glass, said he replaced 30 smashed mirrors last year and 18 this year because of the bird, which has claimed this area east of Syracuse as his territory.

"People come in pretty mad. One guy's been in here three times already because he keeps forgetting to cover up the mirrors," Taylor said.

During breeding season, male woodpeckers aggressively defend their turf, even against imaginary foes, said bird-watcher Benjamin Burtt.

Anne Miller has had two mirrors on her Pontiac Grand Prix smashed and watched the bird attack her neighbor's Malibu.

"I told him to shoo. He did. Then he came right back and finished the job," she said. "Instead of flying off, he walked across the windshield and did the passenger mirror. I was flabbergasted."
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http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,158032,00.html
 
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