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Project Principalis has partnered with the National Aviary in a search for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker since 2019. Visit their website for updates and new information. A directory of the most important recent pages, including details of some of the sightings in recent years is here. You can read a preprint of our results 2019-2021 at bioRxiv.

I will likely be making some personal comments here from time.

As of November 2021, this blog had beenfeatured in two books, one recently published and one forthcoming.

Guy Luneau’s, The Ivory-billed Woodpecker: Taunting Extinction: Survival in the Modern Era includes his elegant analysis of one of the images from 2009.

Title notwithstanding, I think J. Christopher Haney’s Woody’s Last Laugh: How the Extinct Ivory-billed Woodpecker Fools Us into Making 53 Thinking Errors is the most important book on the ivorybill since Tanner, at least; it’s an absolute must for anyone regardless of where they stand on the controversy. It’s an honor to have been so frequently referenced.

I have restored selected older posts, mostly pertaining to the IBWO’s natural history and my hypotheses about foraging sign, habitat, and behavior. Some of these are summarized and updated on the Aviary site as well.

My thinking on many of these matters continues to evolve, and I want to share as much of the process as possible, including some of the blind alleys I’ve followed. Material posted here does not necessarily reflect the current state of my understanding. The evidence thus far supports some of my ideas and not others. Many of our observations are consistent with Tanner’s descriptions, at least in terms of how ivorybills seem to attack dying hardwoods, starting with the outer limbs, as decline and decay progress.

Field efforts are ongoing.

Mark A. Michaels

markprojectcoyoteIBWO @ gmail.com