Ivory-billed Woodpecker Debate Gets Ugly...and Personal

Not uncharacteristically, Mike Collins (aka Fishcrow) has chosen to air his dirty laundry in public. Specifically, he has chosen to openly criticize the editorial staff at PLoS ONE for refusing to publish has manuscript on "Flight mechanics of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker" after initially accepting it for publication. I will leave it to you to decide whether or not his complaints are warranted.

The ornithological and birding communities benefit directly from this public rift in that Collins has chosen to make his long-anticipated manuscript—replete with an abundance of in-flight video footage of large woodpeckers—available online (here). From the Introduction [.pdf]:

Videos were obtained during three encounters in which key field marks consistent with the Ivory-billed Woodpecker were observed, including footage of a cruising flight, two takeoffs into level flight, a short flight, a swooping takeoff, and a swooping landing. The flight mechanics of the birds in these videos are consistent with Ivory-billed Woodpeckers in terms of historical accounts, physiology, and empirical and physics-based models for flap rate. Various additional characteristics of the birds in the videos are consistent with Ivory-billed Woodpeckers, including apparent field marks, a massive bill, a large crest, and an exaggerated leaned-back posture while perched.

Rest assured that Collins’s text and accompanying videos will be dissected and discussed on blogs and in various online forums for months to come.

Last revised: 3/23/09.