[mou] NPR text on Ivory-billed discovery

[Jim Williams]

Text from NPR web site.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=3D4622633
Jim Williams
Wayzata
=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D
Radio Expeditions
Ivory-Billed Woodpecker Rediscovered
Audio for this story will be available at approx. 10:00 a.m. ET

Morning Edition, April 28, 2005 =B7 A group of wildlife scientists=20
believe the ivory-billed woodpecker is not extinct. They say they have=20=

made seven firm sightings of the bird in central Arkansas. The landmark=20=

find caps a search that began more than 60 years ago, after biologists=20=

said North America=92s largest woodpecker had become extinct in the=20
United States.

  The large, showy bird is an American legend -- it disappeared when the=20=

big bottomland forests of North America were logged, and relentless=20
searches have produced only false alarms. Now, in an intensive=20
year-long search in the Cache River and White River national wildlife=20
refuges involving more than 50 experts and field biologists working=20
together as part of the Big Woods Partnership, an ivory-billed male has=20=

been captured on video.

"We have solid evidence, there are solid sightings, this bird is here,"=20=

says Tim Barksdale, a wildlife photographer and biologist.

For an NPR/National Geographic Radio Expeditions story, NPR science=20
correspondent Christopher Joyce joined the search last January along=20
Arkansas=92 White River, where a kayaker spotted what he believed to be=20=

an ivory-billed woodpecker more than a year ago. Many other similar=20
sightings over the last 60 years have raised false hopes.

  But this time, Joyce reports that experts associated with the Cornell=20=

Laboratory of Ornithology in New York and The Nature Conservancy were=20
able to confirm the sighting. They kept the find a secret for more than=20=

a year, partly to give conservation groups and government agencies time=20=

to protect the bird=92s habitat.

The Nature Conservancy has been buying and protecting land along the=20
White and Cache Rivers for years, along with the state and the federal=20=

Fish and Wildlife Service. Since the discovery, they've bought more=20
land to protect the bird.=