I’m looking forward to spending next week in our search area, though I was saddened to hear about recent events in Marksville. I know it has caused great distress to many in that part of the state.

But on a brighter note, one of my top priorities is to see whether there’s been any fresh scaling on the downed sweet gum top. If so, we’ll likely have multiple images that show the source or sources of this unusual work. Fingers crossed.

There’s a great new series of Magellanic Woodpecker pictures over in Bill Benish’s Flickr group. Two birds are on what appears to be a not-very-recently scaled snag. Interestingly though, there are what looks like fresh, lateral bill marks on the wood. This led me to revisit some pictures I took in 2012 of this freshly scaled oak or sweet gum. While I’ve posted a couple of images of this tree in several places, I neglected to post what may be the most significant one. I’m posting it here and have added it to the bark scaling gallery. Note the strike marks in the cambium. There’s no damage to the sapwood, but these appear to come from a broad, chisel-like bill. This seems to be a perfect match for what J.J. Kuhn considered to be diagnostic, per Edith Kuhn Whitehead.

I found another photograph of Magellanic foraging sign that I think is reminiscent of work I found on the small sweet gums this spring.

Finally, it’s really gratifying that BirdLife International referenced my post on IBWO records 1944-2003 in their species fact sheet.

I may post some brief updates from the field and should have a full trip report up in about two weeks.