From Andy Walker
I was a little puzzled by the piece about the “shy” ivory-billed woodpecker rediscovered in Arkansas (13 August, p 19).
The piece says “careful examination of blurry videotapes and photos failed to convince Richard Prum” of the woodpecker’s rediscovery. Yet below the article you show a nice clear photo of the bird. Since high-quality colour photos were not possible 60 years ago when the woodpecker was last seen, I assume the image is recent and part of the collection Prum examined. So why was it so difficult to identify the bird visually?
The editor writes:
• The answer, as we should have pointed out in the article, is that the photo is of a very convincing stuffed specimen. It is not one of the recent poor-quality shots that heralded the bird’s rediscovery.
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Toronto, Canada
