Ivory woodpecker

Ivory woodpecker
Ivory woodpecker ( Campephilus principalis )
Systematics
Class : Birds (aves) Order : Woodpecker birds (Piciformes) Family : Woodpeckers (Picidae) Subfamily : Real woodpeckers (Picinae) Genre : Long-crested woodpecker ( Campephilus ) Type : Ivory woodpecker
Scientific name
Campephilus principalis
( Linnaeus , 1758)

The ivory woodpecker ( Campephilus principalis ), also known as the male woodpecker , is the second largest woodpecker in North America. Closely related to it is the somewhat larger emperor woodpecker ( Campephilus imperialis ), which lived in the highland forests of Mexico. It has to be feared that both species became extinct in the second half of the 20th century, although sightings are reported again and again, but these could never be clearly verified.

features

The ivory woodpecker has a black-and-white pattern, a red hood and an ivory-colored beak. It is between 48 and 53 cm tall and has a wingspan of about 76 cm. The weight of an ivory woodpecker is 450-570 grams. Ivory woodpeckers live to be around 15 years old. Its habitat is the dead wood in forests, often on swampy ground.

Threat history

It was threatened as early as 1880. It was considered extinct by 1920 but was spotted in the Louisiana forests in 1944 . The species was last observed in Cuba in 1987. In 1994 it was therefore declared extinct by the World Conservation Union . In 1998 an expedition in the Sierra Maestra found evidence of a small population, but was unable to observe ivory woodpeckers directly. 2004, however, a canoeist observed in a nature reserve in Arkansas the bird allegedly again. Evidence for the existence of at least one bird in the Cache River National Wildlife Refuge, Arkansas, presented by researchers at Cornell University in April 2005, is controversial in the professional world, so that no final explanation about the status of the species can be made at the moment. In May 2006, prize money of US $ 10,000 was offered to anyone who produces photographic evidence of the continued existence of the ivory woodpecker. The latest project to clarify whether the occurrence of a population in the swamps of Arkansas actually applies, is attempted via a chip-controlled camera surveillance. Since further searches by Cornell University were unsuccessful until May 2007, many scientists fear that the ivory woodpecker is actually extinct.

The ivory woodpecker's hides are rare in European institutions, but can be found, for example, in the Museum Heineanum in Halberstadt , the Natural History Museum Vienna , the Museum für Naturkunde (Berlin) and the Überseemuseum Bremen. There is also a bellows in the natural history collection in Tübingen.

literature

• Fitzpatrick JW, Lammertink M., Luneau MD Jr, Gallagher TW, Harrison BR, Sparling GM, Rosenberg KV, Rohrbaugh RW, Swarthout EC, Wrege PH, Swarthout SB, Dantzker MS, Charif RA, Barksdale TR, Remsen JV Jr, Simon SD , Zollner D .: Ivory-billed woodpecker ( Campephilus principalis ) persists in continental North America . In: Science . 308, No. 5727, 2005, pp. 1460-1462. PMID 15860589 .
• Katja Schmid: Is the ivory woodpecker still alive - or is it? . In: Telepolis . Journal of Net Culture. Bollmann, Cologne September 14, 2005. ISSN  1431-9012
• Tim Gallagher: The Grail Bird - Hot on the Trail of the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker . Houghton Mifflin, Boston 2005. ISBN 0-618-45693-7
• Sibley, DA, LR Bevier, MA Patten and CS Elphick: 2006. Comment on "Ivory-billed Woodpecker ( Campephilus principalis ) persists in continental North America". Science 311: 1555a.
• Fitzpatrick, JW, M. Lammertink, MD Luneau, Jr., TW Gallagher, and KV Rosenberg. 2006. Response to comment on "Ivory-billed Woodpecker ( Campephilus principalis ) persists in continental North America". Science 311: 1555b.
• Johanna Romberg: Zaubervogel, where are you? GEO 11/2007, pp. 140–152, ISSN no. 0342-8311

Web links

Commons : Ivory Woodpeckers  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files

• Information about the threat of the species (English)
• Website about the ivory-billed woodpecker (English)
• Discussions rediscovery (English)
• Campephilus principalis in the endangered Red List species the IUCN 2008. Posted by: BirdLife International, 2008. Accessed on December 22 of 2008.
• Klaus Ruge; Carola Preuß: SWR2 knowledge. In search of the ivory woodpecker. 60 Years Lost - The Ivory Billed Woodpecker in Arkansas [broadcast on April 28, 2008]

swell

1. ↑ Robots during bird-watching by Katja Seefeldt, February 24, 2007, in Spiegel online
2. ↑ Tom Koch in the Magdeburger Volksstimme of July 13, 2007