The Ivory-billed Woodpecker
The Ivory-billed woodpecker (Campephilus principalis) is also known as the Grail Bird or the "Lord God" Bird (after a comment by Theodore Roosevelt). It has captivated Americans for decades, perhaps even centuries - from Native Americans and early settlers who killed it for its head and beak, to modern-day ornithologists and amateur bird-watchers desperate to confirm that it survives in the southern forests. Described first by Mark Catesby, then famously by Alexander Wilson and John James Audubon, the Ivory-billed is the largest American woodpecker and one of the most elusive. Its preference for living deep inside the large wooded tracts of the Southeastern United States has always made it difficult to find. By the late 1800s, increased human settlement and massive logging projects had decimated the woodpecker's habitat and their numbers plummeted. By the 1940s, the Ivory-billed was rarely, if ever, seen in the wild.
Sightings of the Ivory-billed woodpecker have been reported sporadically over the years, but never confirmed. Most experts believe that people confuse the Ivory-billed woodpecker with the smaller, darker-billed, yet similar-looking, Pileated woodpecker. In 2005, ornithologists from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology announced that the Ivory-billed had been found and documented along the Cache River in eastern Arkansas. This set off a flurry of expeditions, articles, and books about the bird, with various experts taking sides in the debate:
Is the Ivory-billed woodpecker extinct or not?
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Mark Catesby. The Natural History of Carolina, Florida, and the Bahama Islands. London: Printed at the expense of the author, 1731-1743.
Volume 1, plate 16 - Ivory-billed woodpecker.
Beginning in 1712, English naturalist Mark Catesby (1683-1749 embarked on the first of two scientific expeditions to the southern colonies of North America. He collected plant and animal specimens and painted them in watercolor. After he returned to England in 1726, Catesby spent seventeen years personally translating the watercolors into 220 folio-sized plates. King George III purchased the watercolors in 1768, and they are still owned by the British royal family.
Carl Linnaeus used Catesby's drawings in the tenth edition of Systema Naturae (1758); Lewis and Clark consulted his work during their expedition; and Audubon used the artwork as a model.
Catesby is considered to be the first European to describe the Ivory-billed woodpecker, which he called the "largest white-bill wood-pecker."
Alexander Wilson. American Ornithology, or, The Natural History of the Birds of the United States. Edinburgh: Printed for Constable and Co., 1831.
Wilson wrote that the Ivory-billed woodpecker "stands at the head of the whole class of woodpeckers hitherto discovered." He described catching a male Ivory-billed near Wilmington, North Carolina, and "having wounded it slightly in the wing, on being caught, it uttered a loudly reiterated, and most piteous note, exactly resembling the violent crying of a young child; which terrified my horse so, as nearly to have cost me my life." Wilson checked into a hotel to draw the bird, but while he was out, the Ivory-billed tried to escape and nearly destroyed the wall near the window and a mahohany table in the process. "He lived with me nearly three days, but refused all sustenance, and I witnessed his death with regret."
John James Audubon. Birds of America. New York: Macmillan, 1937.
Plate 66 - Ivory-billed woodpecker.
Audubon's description of the Ivory-billed woodpecker is as follows: "The flight of this bird is graceful in the extreme, although seldom prolonged to more than a few hundred yards at a time, unless when it has to cross a large river, which it does in deep undulations, opening its wings at first to their full extent, and nearly closing them to renew the propelling impulse. The transit from one tree to another, even should the distance be as much as a hundred yards, is performed by a single sweep, and the bird appears as if merely swinging itself from the top of the one tree to that of the other, forming an elegantly curved line. At this moment all the beauty of the plumage is exhibited, and strikes the beholder with pleasure. It never utters any sound whilst on wing, unless during the love-season; but at all other times, no sooner has this bird alighted than its remarkable voice is heard, at almost every leap which it makes, whilst ascending against the upper parts of the trunk of a tree, or its highest branches. Its notes are clear, loud, and yet rather plaintive. They are heard at a considerable distance, perhaps half a mile, and resemble the false high note of a clarionet. They are usually repeated three times in succession, and may be represented by the monosyllable pait, pait, pait. These are heard so frequently as to induce me to say that the bird spends few minutes of the day without uttering them, and this circumstance leads to its destruction, which is aimed at, not because (as is supposed by some) this species is a destroyer of trees, but more because it is a beautiful bird, and its rich scalp attached to the upper mandible forms an ornament for the war-dress of most of our Indians, or for the shot-pouch of our squatters and hunters, by all of whom the bird is shot merely for that purpose."
Jacob H. Studer. The Birds of North America. New York: Published under the auspices of the Natural Science Association of America, 1895. Illustrated by Theodore Jasper.
Plate 26 - Ivory-billed woodpecker.
According to Jacob Henry Studer (1840-1904), "the manners of the Ivory-billed have a dignity about them far superior to the herd of common Woodpeckers. To the latter, trees, shrubbery, orchards, fences, fence-posts, or even old logs lying on the ground, are all alike interesting in their indefatigable search after prey; but the Ivory-billed is not satisfied with things of such an humble character, for he delights in selecting the most towering trees of the forests in his exploring expeditions after food or amusement."
Arthur A. Allen and P. Paul Kellogg. "Recent Observations on the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker," from The Auk. Boston: American Ornithologists' Union, 1884-.
Vol. 54, no. 2 (April 1937).
Many ornithologists considered the Ivory-billed woodpecker to be extinct as early as the 1920s. But in 1935, the authors and their research team (all from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology) spent several days observing nesting Ivory-billed woodpeckers in a Louisiana forest. During this time, they were able to produce the very first motion pictures and sound recordings of the bird.
Oliver L. Austin. Birds of the World: A Survey of the Twenty-Seven Orders and One Hundred and Fifty-Five Families. New York: Golden Press, 1961
Pages 192-3 - Woodpeckers: the Ivorybill is the large bird in the center of the picture with white beak and red crest.
At the time of this book's publication, the Ivory-billed woodpecker had not been reported reliably in over a decade and was feared to be extinct.