An Extinct Woodpecker Flies Back Into View

One species that modern birders can never add to their life lists is the imperial woodpecker, but now, a rediscovered 85-second film clip offers a unique opportunity to see this vanished species in action.

Imperial woodpeckers (male on left, Museum specimens, UMMZ 29216 on left, 29217, collected in Durango, Mexico in 1898). Credit: Phil Myers (photographer, copyright holder), Museum of Zoology, University of Michigan.

Raven-sized Campephilus imperialis was once the world’s largest woodpecker, dwarfing the closely related ivory-billed woodpecker. A resident of Mexico’s Sierra Madre Occidental, the imperial woodpecker lived in high-elevation, old-growth forests, where it found plenty of large, dead pines for excavating nest cavities and foraging for beetle larvae. Early in the 20th century, these aristocratic-looking birds often could be found in groups of five to ten. By the 1960s, not even locals saw them any more. Intensive commercial logging and, to a lesser extent, hunting, had taken an irreversible toll.

In 1956, Pennsylvania dentist and amateur ornithologist William L. Rhein caught the last officially recognized glimpse of a living imperial woodpecker. He documented the occasion on 16-mm color motion-picture film, but he kept that souvenir to himself, dismissing it as “very poor footage.” If not for the efforts of Cornell Lab of Ornithology scientist and Campephilus super-fan Martjan Lammertink, those flickering images might have remained lost forever.

Rhein’s movie may be a bit shaky – after all, he shot it with a handheld camera while riding a mule – but except for 160 mounted specimens and study skins, it’s all we have left of this magnificent bird. Lammertink and his colleagues have spent the past few years analyzing each of the film’s 2,041 frames. This month they shared their findings in the pages of The Auk. Better yet, they made the film footage publically available for the first time.

One image-stabilized excerpt captures Rhein’s subject hitching up a tree trunk. Another zooms in to show bark chips flying as she hunts for hidden prey. But, unsteady or not, the unedited version is the most mesmerizing.

I found myself holding my breath as I watched the bird, one of the last of her kind, go about her business. Her forward-curved crest bobs about as she pecks and hops. Then she launches from a treetop with deep, powerful wing strokes and flies out of sight. I can, and will, play that scene over and over, but nothing can ever bring the imperial woodpecker back to life.

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Lammertink and his

Lammertink and his colleagues have spent the past few years analyzing each of the film’s 2,041 frames thanks. vaginismus

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The trigger, piculets,

The trigger, piculets, wrynecks, and sapsuckers are family, Picidae, near-passerine birds. Members of this family are found worldwide, except Australia and New Zealand, Madagascar, and the extreme polar regions. Most species live in forests or forest habitat, although some species are known to live in wooded areas such as rocky slopes and desert.
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Glossy blue-black bird with

Glossy blue-black bird with white markings on neck and back and extensive white on the edge of both upper and underwing following. White underwing also includes a forward edge, so that the black line that runs along the middle underwing, expanding into the black wingtips wider. In adults, the bill ivory in color, white chalk in the teens.
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Traditionally known

Traditionally known ornithologists two subspecies of birds: American Ivory-billed, the more famous of the two, and the Ivory-billed woodpecker in Cuba. Both look similar despite the differences in size and fur. There is some dispute about whether the Cuban Ivory-billed woodpecker more appropriately recognized as a separate species. A recent study of DNA samples taken from specimens in comparison of the two birds Ivory-billed woodpecker, including Imperial ..
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A team of ornithologists

A team of ornithologists from Auburn University and the University of Windsor publish their own report sightings of the Ivory billed woodpecker along the Choctawhatchee River in northwest Florida, beginning in 2005 (Hill et al, 2006.). This report is accompanied by proof that the author himself was considered suggestive for the presence of Ivory-billed woodpecker. Search the Florida area in 2009 failed to produce a specific confirmation.
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That is an extinct species.

That is an extinct species. It is nice seeing them after a long time. Where have you got this video?

There are about 200 species

There are about 200 species and 30 genera in the family. Many species are threatened or endangered because of habitat loss or fragmentation of residence. Two species of woodpeckers, the Ivory-billed woodpecker and the Imperial Woodpecker, is considered dead for about 30 years (there is some controversy recently whether the species still exists)
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The smallest woodpecker is

The smallest woodpecker is Piculet Bar-breasted, with 7 g and 8 cm (3 ¼ inches). Largest woodpecker is the Imperial Woodpecker, on average 58 cm (23 inches) and can be more than 600 g (£ 1.3). The Ivory-billed woodpecker is (o) is slightly smaller than 50 cm (20 inches) and weighs 500 g (£ 1.1). If the two-Ivory billed woodpecker is gone and Imperial woodpecker is the largest extant great slaty woodpecker Southeast Asia, about 50 centimeters (20 inches) and 450 g (1 lbs). Some species show sexual dimorphism in size, length and weight of the bill. In piculets often larger woman, among the woodpeckers that show sexual dimorphism usually males are larger.
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Ivory-billed woodpecker

Ivory-billed woodpecker (Campephilus principalis) is or was one of the largest woodpecker in the world, with nearly 20 inches and 30 inches long in the wings. Is the original virgin forest the southeastern United States (including a separate subspecies native Cuba). Since the destruction of homes, and to hunt for a lower rate, their number shrank to the point where he was not sure if any remain.
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Gotta keep the hope alive -

Gotta keep the hope alive - we don't know for certain that it's extinct, it was well rare to see even when we were certain it was around.

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Hurrah! News like this is

Hurrah! News like this is always good news! Thank you very much, Frances Backhouse, for bringing it to us!

Of course, with better camera optics, like Swarovski's Swarovision for binoculars, it would be even better - but I'm certainly not complaining under the circumstances!

Using a handheld camera while riding on a mule - isn't it incredible?!?

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Now this is a happy story.

Now this is a happy story. I've read somewhere that over the years about 100.000 species were extinct.

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I remember when I was a little kid and there was those cartoon at TV with Woody...do you remember it?I bough a DVD with more series for my daughter.God post about woodpecker,thanks!

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