Lost and not found
Ivory-billed woodpecker, RIP
OH, WHAT FUN it was back in the Oughts when folks in Arkansas still had hopes of finding/seeing/recording the Lord God Bird. Which is another name for the American ivory-billed woodpecker. Which is another name for Campephilus principalis.
Somebody thought they got a look at one in 2004 near the Cache River outside Brinkley, Ark., and folks flocked to the woods with their camcorders. Coffee cups, T-shirts and editorials featured the bird. Even if the real thing proved elusive.
Now Reuters reports that the United States government has concluded that the ivory-billed woodpecker is extinct. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has declared the bird—and 22 other birds, fish and other species—gone forever.
Which means volunteers, scholars and searchers didn’t find the Lord God Bird in Florida, either. After the sighting here, somebody in the panhandle thought they’d caught a glimpse, too, and the search went on down in the swamps. That search came up with nothing solid.
This is a loss for our planet. Because any bird who’d get a nickname after somebody saw it and exclaimed, “Lord God!” must have been a beautiful sight to behold. Now that the government has made its declaration, an even more official source has confirmed it. Wednesday morning, Wikipedia said the ivory-billed woodpecker “was” a bird native to bottomland hardwood forests in the South. Past tense.
The last confirmed sighting of the ivory-billed woodpecker—not to be confused with its smaller cousin, which is numerous enough that one is probably outside your window now—was in 1944. The sighting in 2004 was unconfirmed. Although hope began rising at the time. Now, not so much. We might have better luck finding the Roc.
From the AP: “It’s a rare move for wildlife officials to give up hope on a plant or animal, but government scientists say they’ve exhausted [efforts] to find these 23. And they warn climate change, on top of other pressures, could make such disappearances more common as a warming planet adds to the dangers facing imperiled plants and wildlife.”
Yes, but climate change didn’t wipe out the ivory-billed woodpecker. Logging did. And mankind pushing the wild out of his way. Word has it that in the 1920s, when the bird was already on its way out, somebody found a nesting pair in Florida, so local taxidermists shot them “for specimens.” Typical.
There were other species declared extinct this week. Including something called the flat pigtoe freshwater mussel. But none of the others so startled viewers by their appearance that the humans called on their Maker.
(Notably, the state of Hawaii has the most species on the extinction list, according to the article. Eight birds and a plant from the islands were listed this week. Apparently that’s because the flora and fauna on Hawaii have such small ranges that they can “blink out quickly.”)
Mankind, for all his faults, has done a good job with some species, including the bald eagle, the brown pelican and the humpback whale. These breeds were brought back from the brink. But many more are being wiped out.
Word around the campfire is that conservationists have pivoted from trying to save individual species to saving those habitats instead. That not only allows endangered animals and plants to thrive, but also those critters that we don’t know about (yet) that can eat, mate and reproduce down in the weeds. Maybe Homo sapiens really is man the discerning. Or is becoming so.
IS ALL hope gone? Maybe only 99.99 percent of it. The announcement by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service kicks off a three-month comment period before the official, official, official declaration can be made. For the ivory-billed woodpecker . . . so you’re saying there’s a chance?
Maybe, perhaps, hope endures, and there is always the possibility that a body will appear in the next few months with a recording or photo or video of the Lord God Bird. After all, scientists tell the papers that it is possible that one of these 23 species could reappear from their hiding place. One day.
Knock on wood.