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The Grail Bird: Hot on the Trail of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker
What is it about the ivory-billed woodpecker? Why does this ghost of the southern swamps arouse such an obsessive level of passion in its devotees, who range from respected researchers to the flakiest Loch Ness monster fanatics and Elvis chasers?
Since the early twentieth century, scientists have been trying their best to prove that the ivory-bill is extinct. But every time they think they've finally closed the door, the bird makes an unexpected appearance. It happened in the 1920s, and it’s happened in almost every subsequent decade.
For more than 60 years, each sighting has been met with ridicule and scorn. Respected researchers and naturalists have been branded as quacks just for having the temerity to say that the ivory-bill still exists. Yet the reports still trickle in. Is there any truth to these sightings, or are they just a case of wishful thinking, misidentification, or outright fabrication?
To unravel the mystery, author Tim Gallagher heads south, deep into the eerie swamps and bayous of the vast Mississippi Delta, searching for people who claim to have seen this rarest of birds and following up—sometimes more than 30 years after the fact—on their sightings. He meets a colorful array of characters: a cigar-chomping ex-boxer who took two controversial pictures of an alleged ivory-bill in 1971; a former corporate lawyer who abandoned her career to search for ivory-bills full time; two men who grew up in the ivory-bill’s last known stronghold in a final remnant of primeval forest in Louisiana.
With his buddy Bobby Harrison, a true son of the South from Alabama, Gallagher hits the swamps, wading through hip-deep, boot-sucking mud and canoeing through turgid, mud brown bayous where deadly cottonmouth water moccasins abound. In most cases, they are clearly decades too late. But when the two speak to an Arkansas backwoods kayaker who saw a mystery woodpecker the week before and has a description of the bird that is too good to be a fantasy, the hunt is on.
Their Eureka moment comes a few days later as a huge woodpecker flies in front of their canoe, and they both cry out, “Ivory-bill!” This sighting—the first time since 1944 that two qualified observers positively identify an ivory-billed woodpecker in the United States—quickly leads to the largest search ever launched to find a rare bird, as researchers fan out across the bayou, hoping to document the existence of this most iconic of birds.
Since the early twentieth century, scientists have been trying their best to prove that the ivory-bill is extinct. But every time they think they've finally closed the door, the bird makes an unexpected appearance. It happened in the 1920s, and it’s happened in almost every subsequent decade.
For more than 60 years, each sighting has been met with ridicule and scorn. Respected researchers and naturalists have been branded as quacks just for having the temerity to say that the ivory-bill still exists. Yet the reports still trickle in. Is there any truth to these sightings, or are they just a case of wishful thinking, misidentification, or outright fabrication?
To unravel the mystery, author Tim Gallagher heads south, deep into the eerie swamps and bayous of the vast Mississippi Delta, searching for people who claim to have seen this rarest of birds and following up—sometimes more than 30 years after the fact—on their sightings. He meets a colorful array of characters: a cigar-chomping ex-boxer who took two controversial pictures of an alleged ivory-bill in 1971; a former corporate lawyer who abandoned her career to search for ivory-bills full time; two men who grew up in the ivory-bill’s last known stronghold in a final remnant of primeval forest in Louisiana.
With his buddy Bobby Harrison, a true son of the South from Alabama, Gallagher hits the swamps, wading through hip-deep, boot-sucking mud and canoeing through turgid, mud brown bayous where deadly cottonmouth water moccasins abound. In most cases, they are clearly decades too late. But when the two speak to an Arkansas backwoods kayaker who saw a mystery woodpecker the week before and has a description of the bird that is too good to be a fantasy, the hunt is on.
Their Eureka moment comes a few days later as a huge woodpecker flies in front of their canoe, and they both cry out, “Ivory-bill!” This sighting—the first time since 1944 that two qualified observers positively identify an ivory-billed woodpecker in the United States—quickly leads to the largest search ever launched to find a rare bird, as researchers fan out across the bayou, hoping to document the existence of this most iconic of birds.
272 pages, Hardcover
First published May 18, 2005
26 people are currently reading
452 people want to read
About the author
Tim Gallagher
17 books17 followersBest known for being one of the rediscoverers of the ivory-billed woodpecker (which was believed to be extinct since the 1940s) and writing THE GRAIL BIRD, author Tim Gallagher has another passion that has driven him since childhood -- the ancient sport of falconry. Gallagher's most recent adventure -- detailed in his new book, FALCON FEVER -- was to follow in the footsteps of 13th-century Emperor Frederick II -- a scientist, architect, poet, musician, and all-around Renaissance man 200 years before the births of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci. Frederick was also the greatest falconer who ever lived. His talks are illustrated with photographs of Frederick's spectacular castles and hunting areas, stunning hand-painted illustrations from his illuminated manuscript on falconry, and pictures of modern falconers hunting in the same style as Frederick II."
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 95 reviews
March 9, 2018
This is the story of the rediscovery of the ivory-billed woodpecker. For years, it was believed extinct. The last universally accepted sighting was reported in the 1940’s. The old growth forests of the South where it made its home had been logged into oblivion. But …
Sporadic reports kept trickling in. However, since the established consensus was that the bird was extinct, these reports were viewed with an open skepticism and ridicule normally reserved for bigfoot sightings. But, in 2004, researchers from Cornell University established the presence of the birds in the swamps and bayous of the Mississippi delta. Their rediscovery was announced in 2005 as the book was going to press.
It's a fascinating story of perseverance. Admittedly, no photographic evidence was captured. The middle of the book has a selection of photos. But few are of ivory-billed woodpeckers, and, of those, none are more recent than 1970, and that one is controversial, or at least it was at the time. I figured that the lack of recent photos meant that the expedition had been a failure. But, reading on, I was happy to discover that I was wrong. Admittedly, I’m a layperson with regards to birds, but it seems like too many birders of sterling reputation and impressive skills have seen these birds now for there to be any doubt, photos or not. And, for all I know, photos have been taken in the interval since this book was published. The bird tends to live in areas where few people venture, so it's not surprising that sightings are rare.
Anyway, this was a fun book. Recommended!
Sporadic reports kept trickling in. However, since the established consensus was that the bird was extinct, these reports were viewed with an open skepticism and ridicule normally reserved for bigfoot sightings. But, in 2004, researchers from Cornell University established the presence of the birds in the swamps and bayous of the Mississippi delta. Their rediscovery was announced in 2005 as the book was going to press.
It's a fascinating story of perseverance. Admittedly, no photographic evidence was captured. The middle of the book has a selection of photos. But few are of ivory-billed woodpeckers, and, of those, none are more recent than 1970, and that one is controversial, or at least it was at the time. I figured that the lack of recent photos meant that the expedition had been a failure. But, reading on, I was happy to discover that I was wrong. Admittedly, I’m a layperson with regards to birds, but it seems like too many birders of sterling reputation and impressive skills have seen these birds now for there to be any doubt, photos or not. And, for all I know, photos have been taken in the interval since this book was published. The bird tends to live in areas where few people venture, so it's not surprising that sightings are rare.
Anyway, this was a fun book. Recommended!
July 24, 2019
This is more a digression than a review, so if you're not interested in obsessions, skip on by.
As it happens, this is the third book in a row I've read that has dealt with obsessions. The first was San Miguel by T.C. Boyle. It is based on the real-life obsessions of two men with living on one of the Channel Islands in the most isolated circumstances imaginable. It's based on real families who inhabited the island in the 1880s and 1930's. They each managed to persuade their spouses to take part in this experience along with their children. In one case the family adjusted fairly well, but both stories ended badly.
The second book was The Feather Thief by Kirk Wallace Johnson, and the obsession in this case was with fly-tying, for which competitions are held. These flies are not for fishing; they are considered art works and the "recipes" always include feathers from exotic birds who are extinct or about to be. A young American champion fly-tier studying in London broke into the Tring museum and stole at least 299 irreplaceable feathers. He was caught, tried, and let go. Sixty-six of those feathers were never retrieved and of the ones who were many were missing their tags, making them useless for research studies. It was unproven, and unprovable, but it appears he sold them for a great deal of money to collectors who know they were stolen but want to keep them. It is hard to say if this man's obsession was with fly-tying or with money, but my guess is money. While no one was physically harmed, this obsession did not end well either.
I can understand the obsession with the ivory-billed woodpecker in The Grail Bird by Tim Gallagher, but what these birders go through in searching for this most elusive bird was tough to even read about: slogging through swamps hip-deep and filled with deadly cottonmouth snakes, and that's just for starters. Now THAT is an obsession. But with this obsession no one got seriously injured (or dead).
I don't think I ever fully appreciated the lengths to which people with obsessions will go (and I'm not saying I don't have a few myself) until I read these three books. It turns out to be a very interesting subject. Also, when does an absorbing interest turn into an obsession? So are obsessions by definition inherently bad? I don't know the answer, but this did make me start to ask the question.
As it happens, this is the third book in a row I've read that has dealt with obsessions. The first was San Miguel by T.C. Boyle. It is based on the real-life obsessions of two men with living on one of the Channel Islands in the most isolated circumstances imaginable. It's based on real families who inhabited the island in the 1880s and 1930's. They each managed to persuade their spouses to take part in this experience along with their children. In one case the family adjusted fairly well, but both stories ended badly.
The second book was The Feather Thief by Kirk Wallace Johnson, and the obsession in this case was with fly-tying, for which competitions are held. These flies are not for fishing; they are considered art works and the "recipes" always include feathers from exotic birds who are extinct or about to be. A young American champion fly-tier studying in London broke into the Tring museum and stole at least 299 irreplaceable feathers. He was caught, tried, and let go. Sixty-six of those feathers were never retrieved and of the ones who were many were missing their tags, making them useless for research studies. It was unproven, and unprovable, but it appears he sold them for a great deal of money to collectors who know they were stolen but want to keep them. It is hard to say if this man's obsession was with fly-tying or with money, but my guess is money. While no one was physically harmed, this obsession did not end well either.
I can understand the obsession with the ivory-billed woodpecker in The Grail Bird by Tim Gallagher, but what these birders go through in searching for this most elusive bird was tough to even read about: slogging through swamps hip-deep and filled with deadly cottonmouth snakes, and that's just for starters. Now THAT is an obsession. But with this obsession no one got seriously injured (or dead).
I don't think I ever fully appreciated the lengths to which people with obsessions will go (and I'm not saying I don't have a few myself) until I read these three books. It turns out to be a very interesting subject. Also, when does an absorbing interest turn into an obsession? So are obsessions by definition inherently bad? I don't know the answer, but this did make me start to ask the question.
February 27, 2009
There are several books out about the legendary ivory-billed woodpecker. They all are good, but in their own way, each is very different. Gallagher’s is an adventurous romp that takes you along for the ride. Along the way we meet many of the people and places that are part of Ghost Bird’s mythos.
“I feel like I’m really hanging out alone on a limb with the Sasquatch chasers and Elvis sighters,” he laments at one point.
“You definitely are” replied ivory-bill chaser David Luneau.
Gallagher pulls us into the chase; we are “hot of the trail” with him in a canoe in Bayou de View, the Arkansas swamp where the lost species was rediscovered in 2004. The discovery became a national sensation. Hope had prevailed. Or had it? The Ghost Bird remains just as ghostly.
If the ivory-billed woodpecker does still exist, it has become a master of evasion, but that’s just the point. Sometimes to survive, that's exactly what you have to do.
“I feel like I’m really hanging out alone on a limb with the Sasquatch chasers and Elvis sighters,” he laments at one point.
“You definitely are” replied ivory-bill chaser David Luneau.
Gallagher pulls us into the chase; we are “hot of the trail” with him in a canoe in Bayou de View, the Arkansas swamp where the lost species was rediscovered in 2004. The discovery became a national sensation. Hope had prevailed. Or had it? The Ghost Bird remains just as ghostly.
If the ivory-billed woodpecker does still exist, it has become a master of evasion, but that’s just the point. Sometimes to survive, that's exactly what you have to do.
May 27, 2008
Reading this book made me want to go in search of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. It also caused me to dislike Singer sewing machines.
October 12, 2025
What a cool story. Imma find this bird
June 26, 2014
I read this book for my Noble County book club. It's another example of a book that explains why being part of a book club is a good thing. It would have been unlikely for me to pick up this book and I almost surely would not have finished it if I knew a discussion weren't coming up.
The book at over 250 pages could easily have been edited down to 150. I could have done without all the stories of back road wrong turns and small town cafes. So why did I bump the stars up to four and push it in my husband's hand and tell him he really needed to read it? It's because it did a great job of reminding me that even small individual choices can make a big difference. I was saddened to be reminded of the devastation that greed has wrecked on our planet in just the past 100 years. By the late 1990's the world's bird experts were pretty much convinced that the beautiful ivory-billed woodpecker was extinct then a back country kayaker became convinced that he had sighted one. This sighting spurred many exploratory trips by Cornell's expert birders. I won't spoil it but this became a real adventure/suspense story in 2004.
The ivory-billed woodpecker's habitat had been slowly but steadily destroyed first by demand for timber by such things as Model T tires and then cypress furniture. The final blow came in the late 60's and 70's when vegetarian demand for meat substitutes drove the price of soy sky high and farmers were draining every swamp around to grow soybeans.
Bottom line I hope to think carefully before I buy stuff, and ask more often, do I really need it? I'm not so good at doing this but will try harder to remember, every piece of plastic and wood I claim is having planet consequences. A good reminder as I go into retirement with a reduced budget for stuff.
The book at over 250 pages could easily have been edited down to 150. I could have done without all the stories of back road wrong turns and small town cafes. So why did I bump the stars up to four and push it in my husband's hand and tell him he really needed to read it? It's because it did a great job of reminding me that even small individual choices can make a big difference. I was saddened to be reminded of the devastation that greed has wrecked on our planet in just the past 100 years. By the late 1990's the world's bird experts were pretty much convinced that the beautiful ivory-billed woodpecker was extinct then a back country kayaker became convinced that he had sighted one. This sighting spurred many exploratory trips by Cornell's expert birders. I won't spoil it but this became a real adventure/suspense story in 2004.
The ivory-billed woodpecker's habitat had been slowly but steadily destroyed first by demand for timber by such things as Model T tires and then cypress furniture. The final blow came in the late 60's and 70's when vegetarian demand for meat substitutes drove the price of soy sky high and farmers were draining every swamp around to grow soybeans.
Bottom line I hope to think carefully before I buy stuff, and ask more often, do I really need it? I'm not so good at doing this but will try harder to remember, every piece of plastic and wood I claim is having planet consequences. A good reminder as I go into retirement with a reduced budget for stuff.
May 23, 2019
When I first began this book, I wasn't sure if I would have the emotional fortitude to continue reading it. The story of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker's near-demise as a species is a heartbreaking one, a tale of unbridled destruction and exploitation of the old-growth cypress, tupelo, sweet gum and oak forests of the southern swamp-lands. And while the timber industry was the biggest culprit in this destruction of habitat, ornithologists themselves were also partly to blame for the birds' disappearance. Once the Ivory-billed Woodpecker population (and that of the Carolina Parakeet as well) was known to be dwindling, a "collect them while you still can" mentality took hold, and a great many specimens of both species were wantonly shot by scientists who wished to add them to the scientific collections of their various museums and universities.
Fortunately, this terribly depressing chronicle of the species' demise in the first chapter gives way to a far more uplifting saga in the rest of the book, which involves the 21st century search to see if the Ivory-billed Woodpecker still exists as a living species. This book was well-written, with fascinating, humorous and stirring descriptions of the people and events involved in the project. I found it to be a very moving, informative and compelling book. I've always been interested in the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, and now after reading this book I am somewhat hopeful that the species may still survive.
Fortunately, this terribly depressing chronicle of the species' demise in the first chapter gives way to a far more uplifting saga in the rest of the book, which involves the 21st century search to see if the Ivory-billed Woodpecker still exists as a living species. This book was well-written, with fascinating, humorous and stirring descriptions of the people and events involved in the project. I found it to be a very moving, informative and compelling book. I've always been interested in the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, and now after reading this book I am somewhat hopeful that the species may still survive.
October 3, 2018
I loved this book! As a bird nerd I found it exciting to read. I could sense the energy of the researchers and now I want to head south and look for one myself!
September 3, 2023
Month of March 2022 - Nature
Originally published in 2005.
The Grail Bird: Hot on the Trail of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker by Tim Gallagher (2005), 1st edition, hardcover (no jacket), 272 pages.
I happened to be in the right place, at the right time, on the right day, for 10 seconds on one hot summer day in 1979. I was 14 years old and living on Cow Bayou, in Southeast Texas, when I saw it fly and land on our neighbor’s cabin window…the largest woodpecker I had ever seen, with a black and white body and red on its head. As he admired himself through the mirrored window, I admired him while standing between two sweet gum trees.
Little did I know that would be the last time I’d ever see what I now know was most likely the “Good God”, pileated woodpecker, not actually the “Lord God”, ivory-billed woodpecker, since, according to this book, the ivory-billed woodpecker was nearly extinct, even back then in 1979, with only a handful sightings ever recorded since 1935. Even the pileated woodpecker has become a rare sighting around here. My mom last seen one land across the bayou, on an old dead cypress tree, about 3 years ago.
There has been only one recorded sighting of an ivory-billed woodpecker in Texas back in April 1966 in the Big Thicket National Preserve. It is interesting to note that, in October 1974, the 84,550-acre Big Thicket National Preserve was created due to that one sighting of the ivory-billed woodpecker in 1966 by John V. Dennis, even though it was not believed and the sighting renounced by Ornithologist Jim Tanner. (p. 21)
The search for the ivory-billed woodpecker was real and it was serious cut-throat business among the enthusiast birdwatchers and the Ornithologists out there. Without solid proof of sighting a rare bird, the credibility of their whole profession could hang in the balance. At the same time, if you spotted one, you kept it secret and tried to get the photos or the sound recordings yourself or risked someone else getting the credit, or worse case scenario, finding hundreds of birdwatchers flying in from all over the world to see this bird, destroying the habitat.
This list shows just how elusive the ivory-billed woodpecker really was:
1944 - a pair in the Singer Tract, Madison Parish, Louisiana
1950’s - east of Pensacola, Florida
1955 - a pair in Florida
1958 - one in Thomasville, Georgia
1971 - a pair in the Atchafalaya Swamp, west of Baton Rouge, Louisiana (polaroid photo shot by Fielding Lewis)
1975 - one crossing a highway in the Atchafalaya Swamp 20 miles west of Baton Rouge, Louisiana
1977-78 - a pair east of Catahoula, in the Atchafalaya Basin
1987 - Atchafalaya Basin by Fielding Lewis, guy who shot polaroid in 1971
1999 - Pearl River Wildlife Management area near Slidell, in southeastern Louisiana, an hour’s drive from new Orleans
2000 - one at Pearl River, Louisiana (Mary)
2000 - one at Three Rivers Wildlife Management Area, Louisiana (within a couple weeks of each other-same person, Mary)
2003 - Arkansas’s White River National Wildlife Refuge (Mary)
2004-2005 - one or possibly two ivory-billed woodpeckers sighted only a handful of times (about 7) very briefly flying here or there by teams of Ornithologists and bird watchers, including the author and his friend, Bobby, over a period of 2 years at Bayou de View in the Cache River National Park (eastern Arkansas)...still no photographs, no videos and no sound recordings, except for maybe a couple double drums that were inconclusive.
So, only 3 pictures of the ivory-billed woodpecker ever recorded in the whole wide world of this bird from the Singer Tract in 1935, Cuba in 1948 and a questionable polaroid snapshot from the Atchafalaya Basin in 1971? Only one 1935 sound recording and one 00:31 second video? (which are online, see below)
What is the status of the ivory-billed woodpecker today, seventeen years after this book has been published?
According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Southeast Region Louisiana Ecological Services Field Office Lafayette, Louisiana, Recovery Plan report dated April 16, 2010, the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker is considered “extinct”. There have been no sightings or signs anywhere in the U.S. since 2005; therefore, there can be no recovery plan.
https://ecos.fws.gov/docs/five_year_r...
Other books mentioned that might be worth looking into:
“Eskimo Year”
“Iceland Summer”
“Birds in the Wilderness”
(p. 10, all by George Miksch Sutton)
“Wild America” by Roger Tory Peterson
“Tales of a Louisiana Duck Hunter” by Lewis Fielding (a.k.a. Chief who lived in Atchafalaya Basin and who took the 1971 polaroid picture of the ivory-billed woodpecker. (p. 107)
“The Land of the Giants” by Greg Guirard…a Cajun author and photographer (on pgs. 136-139 in “The Grail Bird”, the author provides interesting info on the village of Bayou Chene and how the levees built in the 1930’s rerouted yearly flood waters into the village, forcing the people to desert the area. Today, homes lie under sediment washed in year after year after year. The only thing kept dug out and cared for is the village cemetery. He then makes it to Fausse Point, land of my Cajun ancestors. In summer of 2017, we made the drive around and about that levee and got road blocked a couple of times, just like the author claimed. We’d drive up some private road to the tops of the levee and drive the top for a while, then head down a dirt road to the bottom again and drive that a while. I didn’t know there were TRAILS! We drove to Lake Fausse Pointe State Park, but it was still closed down at that time due to what they called an “inland tropical depression”..not even a hurricane, from the summer before, in August 2016. It caused one of the highest recorded floods of all time for that area.
WEBSITES
All About Birds Website (Cornell Lab of Ornithology), link to hear a 1935 recording of the sound and a little short 00:31 second video, both provided by Arthur Allen, along with photos and facts about the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker:
https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/I...
Audubon website, Tim Gallagher’s blog of his search of the ivory-billed woodpecker in Cuba, link:
https://www.audubon.org/section/chasi...
Mary Scott’s, birdingamerica.com, is no longer a viable website. She now has the “Birdchick Blog”:
http://www.birdchick.com/
Mary gave up being a corporate lawyer and became a Web Designer so she can work from home or anywhere while she went ghost-bird chasing, looking for some of the most rare and potentially extinct birds, including the ivory-billed woodpecker.
NOTES ON THE IVORY-BILLED WOODPECKERS IN 2005
* Nomadic by nature, a “disaster species”, showing up in areas with a lot of recently killed trees.
* Holes are larger and more oval than ones created by the pileated woodpecker
* Large lateral grooves in the bark of trees, signs of the woodpecker trying to remove the bark to get to the insects behind, especially fond of the beetle larvae
* Woodpeckers are more active and vocal in spring and winter, and more visible because of trees being bare.
* Sightings were crossing I-10 somewhere along the 20-mile Atchafalaya Swamp Bridge between Baton Rouge and Lafayette...back in 2005
* Sightings in the Atchafalaya Basin NOTE: What you see today is nearly 100% 2nd growth. The basin had been pretty much clear-cut by the middle of the 20th century beginning right after the Civil War when “a lot of land and lumber companies in the North were practically given the land down here.” (per author Greg Guirard, p. 138).
* Believed to have thrived in “virgin” forests before clear-cutting became the norm
* About 6 square mile territory
PERSONAL NOTES
On page 143, the author writes, as he’s driving around the levees and back-roads of Louisiana: “I’d hate to get nailed for trespassing and have some police chief with a fifty-two-inch gun belt run my ass out of town or shoot me in the foot and leave me for dead.”
How funny! That is the stigma of Louisiana people, in general. My Uncle James used to say, “You never want to get stopped by those Louisiana policeman. They’ll have two or three stopped at one time and they want cash right then and there or they’ll haul your ass to jail.” And after his brother died (my Uncle Shelton), someone came and disassembled his covered parking and rode off with it, while everyone was away attending the funeral. Haha...how crazy! His death had been reported as an accidental death, even though he was extremely weak and riddled with severe osteoarthritis, when they found his heavy dresser on top of him. My Aunt Robbie told me that his Rolex watch and other gold pieces also went missing. That was back in 2002, so yes, that’s the stigma of Louisiana.
PHOTO TAKING TIP USING YOUR CELL PHONE & BINOCULARS
P. 169-70: Use a pocket size digital camera, hold it to the eyepiece of a spotting scope or binoculars…take a telephoto shot. WHAT? And he says he’s seen pictures good enough to publish in books or magazines. I’m sure this can be done on a Samsung, but definitely not the iPhone 12 Pro Max. The quality of my photos from my phone SUCK compared to my son’s Samsung cell phone. See the YouTube on exactly how to do this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=des...
Originally published in 2005.
The Grail Bird: Hot on the Trail of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker by Tim Gallagher (2005), 1st edition, hardcover (no jacket), 272 pages.
I happened to be in the right place, at the right time, on the right day, for 10 seconds on one hot summer day in 1979. I was 14 years old and living on Cow Bayou, in Southeast Texas, when I saw it fly and land on our neighbor’s cabin window…the largest woodpecker I had ever seen, with a black and white body and red on its head. As he admired himself through the mirrored window, I admired him while standing between two sweet gum trees.
Little did I know that would be the last time I’d ever see what I now know was most likely the “Good God”, pileated woodpecker, not actually the “Lord God”, ivory-billed woodpecker, since, according to this book, the ivory-billed woodpecker was nearly extinct, even back then in 1979, with only a handful sightings ever recorded since 1935. Even the pileated woodpecker has become a rare sighting around here. My mom last seen one land across the bayou, on an old dead cypress tree, about 3 years ago.
There has been only one recorded sighting of an ivory-billed woodpecker in Texas back in April 1966 in the Big Thicket National Preserve. It is interesting to note that, in October 1974, the 84,550-acre Big Thicket National Preserve was created due to that one sighting of the ivory-billed woodpecker in 1966 by John V. Dennis, even though it was not believed and the sighting renounced by Ornithologist Jim Tanner. (p. 21)
The search for the ivory-billed woodpecker was real and it was serious cut-throat business among the enthusiast birdwatchers and the Ornithologists out there. Without solid proof of sighting a rare bird, the credibility of their whole profession could hang in the balance. At the same time, if you spotted one, you kept it secret and tried to get the photos or the sound recordings yourself or risked someone else getting the credit, or worse case scenario, finding hundreds of birdwatchers flying in from all over the world to see this bird, destroying the habitat.
This list shows just how elusive the ivory-billed woodpecker really was:
1944 - a pair in the Singer Tract, Madison Parish, Louisiana
1950’s - east of Pensacola, Florida
1955 - a pair in Florida
1958 - one in Thomasville, Georgia
1971 - a pair in the Atchafalaya Swamp, west of Baton Rouge, Louisiana (polaroid photo shot by Fielding Lewis)
1975 - one crossing a highway in the Atchafalaya Swamp 20 miles west of Baton Rouge, Louisiana
1977-78 - a pair east of Catahoula, in the Atchafalaya Basin
1987 - Atchafalaya Basin by Fielding Lewis, guy who shot polaroid in 1971
1999 - Pearl River Wildlife Management area near Slidell, in southeastern Louisiana, an hour’s drive from new Orleans
2000 - one at Pearl River, Louisiana (Mary)
2000 - one at Three Rivers Wildlife Management Area, Louisiana (within a couple weeks of each other-same person, Mary)
2003 - Arkansas’s White River National Wildlife Refuge (Mary)
2004-2005 - one or possibly two ivory-billed woodpeckers sighted only a handful of times (about 7) very briefly flying here or there by teams of Ornithologists and bird watchers, including the author and his friend, Bobby, over a period of 2 years at Bayou de View in the Cache River National Park (eastern Arkansas)...still no photographs, no videos and no sound recordings, except for maybe a couple double drums that were inconclusive.
So, only 3 pictures of the ivory-billed woodpecker ever recorded in the whole wide world of this bird from the Singer Tract in 1935, Cuba in 1948 and a questionable polaroid snapshot from the Atchafalaya Basin in 1971? Only one 1935 sound recording and one 00:31 second video? (which are online, see below)
What is the status of the ivory-billed woodpecker today, seventeen years after this book has been published?
According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Southeast Region Louisiana Ecological Services Field Office Lafayette, Louisiana, Recovery Plan report dated April 16, 2010, the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker is considered “extinct”. There have been no sightings or signs anywhere in the U.S. since 2005; therefore, there can be no recovery plan.
https://ecos.fws.gov/docs/five_year_r...
Other books mentioned that might be worth looking into:
“Eskimo Year”
“Iceland Summer”
“Birds in the Wilderness”
(p. 10, all by George Miksch Sutton)
“Wild America” by Roger Tory Peterson
“Tales of a Louisiana Duck Hunter” by Lewis Fielding (a.k.a. Chief who lived in Atchafalaya Basin and who took the 1971 polaroid picture of the ivory-billed woodpecker. (p. 107)
“The Land of the Giants” by Greg Guirard…a Cajun author and photographer (on pgs. 136-139 in “The Grail Bird”, the author provides interesting info on the village of Bayou Chene and how the levees built in the 1930’s rerouted yearly flood waters into the village, forcing the people to desert the area. Today, homes lie under sediment washed in year after year after year. The only thing kept dug out and cared for is the village cemetery. He then makes it to Fausse Point, land of my Cajun ancestors. In summer of 2017, we made the drive around and about that levee and got road blocked a couple of times, just like the author claimed. We’d drive up some private road to the tops of the levee and drive the top for a while, then head down a dirt road to the bottom again and drive that a while. I didn’t know there were TRAILS! We drove to Lake Fausse Pointe State Park, but it was still closed down at that time due to what they called an “inland tropical depression”..not even a hurricane, from the summer before, in August 2016. It caused one of the highest recorded floods of all time for that area.
WEBSITES
All About Birds Website (Cornell Lab of Ornithology), link to hear a 1935 recording of the sound and a little short 00:31 second video, both provided by Arthur Allen, along with photos and facts about the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker:
https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/I...
Audubon website, Tim Gallagher’s blog of his search of the ivory-billed woodpecker in Cuba, link:
https://www.audubon.org/section/chasi...
Mary Scott’s, birdingamerica.com, is no longer a viable website. She now has the “Birdchick Blog”:
http://www.birdchick.com/
Mary gave up being a corporate lawyer and became a Web Designer so she can work from home or anywhere while she went ghost-bird chasing, looking for some of the most rare and potentially extinct birds, including the ivory-billed woodpecker.
NOTES ON THE IVORY-BILLED WOODPECKERS IN 2005
* Nomadic by nature, a “disaster species”, showing up in areas with a lot of recently killed trees.
* Holes are larger and more oval than ones created by the pileated woodpecker
* Large lateral grooves in the bark of trees, signs of the woodpecker trying to remove the bark to get to the insects behind, especially fond of the beetle larvae
* Woodpeckers are more active and vocal in spring and winter, and more visible because of trees being bare.
* Sightings were crossing I-10 somewhere along the 20-mile Atchafalaya Swamp Bridge between Baton Rouge and Lafayette...back in 2005
* Sightings in the Atchafalaya Basin NOTE: What you see today is nearly 100% 2nd growth. The basin had been pretty much clear-cut by the middle of the 20th century beginning right after the Civil War when “a lot of land and lumber companies in the North were practically given the land down here.” (per author Greg Guirard, p. 138).
* Believed to have thrived in “virgin” forests before clear-cutting became the norm
* About 6 square mile territory
PERSONAL NOTES
On page 143, the author writes, as he’s driving around the levees and back-roads of Louisiana: “I’d hate to get nailed for trespassing and have some police chief with a fifty-two-inch gun belt run my ass out of town or shoot me in the foot and leave me for dead.”
How funny! That is the stigma of Louisiana people, in general. My Uncle James used to say, “You never want to get stopped by those Louisiana policeman. They’ll have two or three stopped at one time and they want cash right then and there or they’ll haul your ass to jail.” And after his brother died (my Uncle Shelton), someone came and disassembled his covered parking and rode off with it, while everyone was away attending the funeral. Haha...how crazy! His death had been reported as an accidental death, even though he was extremely weak and riddled with severe osteoarthritis, when they found his heavy dresser on top of him. My Aunt Robbie told me that his Rolex watch and other gold pieces also went missing. That was back in 2002, so yes, that’s the stigma of Louisiana.
PHOTO TAKING TIP USING YOUR CELL PHONE & BINOCULARS
P. 169-70: Use a pocket size digital camera, hold it to the eyepiece of a spotting scope or binoculars…take a telephoto shot. WHAT? And he says he’s seen pictures good enough to publish in books or magazines. I’m sure this can be done on a Samsung, but definitely not the iPhone 12 Pro Max. The quality of my photos from my phone SUCK compared to my son’s Samsung cell phone. See the YouTube on exactly how to do this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=des...
April 9, 2021
The Grail Bird: The Rediscovery of the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker by Tim Gallagher (Houghton Miflin Company 2006) (598.72) (3518).
The last Ivory-Billed Woodpecker sighting in the United States occurred in Louisiana in the 1940's. This largest of all North American woodpeckers has been declared as extinct or at least extirpated in the US.
And yet sightings of these birds occasionally trickle in from across the Deep South. Aside from glimpses of unidentified woodpeckers, there are two typical sounds (a double rap with their bill on a tree trunk, and a call that sounds like “Kint”) that only these birds make that are occasionally heard by birders deep in the swamp somewhere.
Is the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker really extinct? Hardcore birders don't want to think so. And when hope flags, another sighting invariably takes place, and this causes cautious optomism that proof of the birds' existence is almost at hand.
The instant volume is Tim Gallagher's account of the circumstance surrounding his 2004 sighting of what he believed to be an Ivory-Billed Woodpecker and the international interest and effort which went into proving or disproving the author's assertion.
Without giving away too much as a spoiler (if a sixteen year old book can be spoiled), as I write this it is now 2021, and birders are still searching for definitive proof that the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker lives on.
My rating: 7/10, finished 4/8/21 (3518). I purchased a PB copy in good condition on 2/12/21 for $0.75 at McKay's Books.
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March 11, 2024
Read the first 50 pages of this book, and then it sat there for a while and I didn’t pick it up again. Beginning was slow and went a lot into relationships with other birders I was less interested in.
Then I picked I up last night and finished the book in one go. If you’re not a birder you won’t like this book. If you are you’ll love it. It’s the story of the rediscovery of the freakin ivory billed woodpecker people. You already know if this book is for you.
I knew Tim Gallagher spotted the bird and a research team took a video, but I didn’t realize how many sightings the Cornell team had in the swamp in 2004. I need to read what happens next. The book ended with them setting up the research team, but I believe that was the last “accepted” sighting. So what has happened since then? Are they gone?!
Grail bird has made me more of a believer. IVORY BILLS STILL EXIST!!! (At least they did in 2004)
Then I picked I up last night and finished the book in one go. If you’re not a birder you won’t like this book. If you are you’ll love it. It’s the story of the rediscovery of the freakin ivory billed woodpecker people. You already know if this book is for you.
I knew Tim Gallagher spotted the bird and a research team took a video, but I didn’t realize how many sightings the Cornell team had in the swamp in 2004. I need to read what happens next. The book ended with them setting up the research team, but I believe that was the last “accepted” sighting. So what has happened since then? Are they gone?!
Grail bird has made me more of a believer. IVORY BILLS STILL EXIST!!! (At least they did in 2004)
November 23, 2023
Really good, even if the ending is slightly unbelievable. Highly recommend
October 26, 2008
This book's mission is to make you believe that the Ivory Billed Woodpecker, thought to be extinct since late last century, is in fact still flapping its way around in the swamps of southeastern U.S.A.
A team from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology made the short, blurry film of a large bird flying in a remote swamp and caused a rare controversy in the birding community. What followed the release of the film clip was a flurry of activity in that part of the country where hopeful birders "flocked" for a chance to see a true lazarus species (a species that is mistakenly thought to be be extinct only to be "rediscovered" again). No one claimed success and it's fair to say that this claim is without any merit.
The book tries to build a case for the Ivory Bill's continued existence by first laying out all the reasons why you should in fact be skeptical. Next, after laying that foundation, the book shifts gears and attempts to elicit sympathy from the reader by explaining how Ivory Bill populists are widely dismissed, ostracized by the birding community as wackos, and should given more of a chance.
The book is ultimately unconvincing but you have to admire the passion and dedication the author and his team bring to the party. I don't personally think there will ever be definitive proof that Ivory Bills still exist. Based on the available evidence I am firmly in the camp that believes that this magnificent bird is no longer among us. Tragic as it is, sometimes you just have to let go.
A team from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology made the short, blurry film of a large bird flying in a remote swamp and caused a rare controversy in the birding community. What followed the release of the film clip was a flurry of activity in that part of the country where hopeful birders "flocked" for a chance to see a true lazarus species (a species that is mistakenly thought to be be extinct only to be "rediscovered" again). No one claimed success and it's fair to say that this claim is without any merit.
The book tries to build a case for the Ivory Bill's continued existence by first laying out all the reasons why you should in fact be skeptical. Next, after laying that foundation, the book shifts gears and attempts to elicit sympathy from the reader by explaining how Ivory Bill populists are widely dismissed, ostracized by the birding community as wackos, and should given more of a chance.
The book is ultimately unconvincing but you have to admire the passion and dedication the author and his team bring to the party. I don't personally think there will ever be definitive proof that Ivory Bills still exist. Based on the available evidence I am firmly in the camp that believes that this magnificent bird is no longer among us. Tragic as it is, sometimes you just have to let go.
April 15, 2019
If you like birding....
This is a well told story that kept my interest throughout even though I am a fairly unknowledgeable birder. The dedication and stamina of these people is awesome. And the task is so difficult you could forgive anyone who doesn't see the search to it's end. Easy to read, easy to follow even if you know next to nothing about birds. Give it a try!
This is a well told story that kept my interest throughout even though I am a fairly unknowledgeable birder. The dedication and stamina of these people is awesome. And the task is so difficult you could forgive anyone who doesn't see the search to it's end. Easy to read, easy to follow even if you know next to nothing about birds. Give it a try!
April 23, 2018
This was an interesting read! I'd love to see an ivory-billed woodpecker. Since this book was published in 2005, I need to research the status of the species today.
February 18, 2019
Quick, easy read. Great story! Even if your not into birds, the drama of the ivory billed woodpecker is amazing.
August 17, 2021
conveyed to the reader the essence of frustration in the search...waiting for picture still.
October 20, 2024
Reads like a mystery novel. The evidence for the controversial ivory bill sightings is too anecdotal but you get to learn one side of the story.
May 22, 2023
Fun fact - this book was purchased in Vermont (not by me) and still has the shop's bookmark inside.
An important fact that helps gain insight into this book? No. But it's about as interesting as the book itself.
In America, there is a bird. It's the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker. It may or may not be extinct.
Tim Gallagher has become obsessed with said bird. He thinks it might still exist.
And so he sets out to find it.
Only, that's only a third of the book.
The rest is a sweet, cutesy, folksy, amble through the past looking at all the previous possible sightings and who may or may not have made them.
Essentially it's a history of possible sightings.
The mystery of the continued existence of this birder holy grail is blown on the front cover, so once you've started you're basically waiting for the big pay off.
Which never comes.
The final, conclusive, sightings and recordings are delivered with such a lack of fanfare (unfanfare?) that you have to wonder if it was even worth all those months staring at a tree in a swamp.
I'm certainly not sure it was worth reading about it.
But, that said, the book is well written. It's kind of entertaining, and Lord knows Gallagher doesn't leave a single thing out.
If he was going to meet a lot of tedious people and hang out with some of them in a canoe, then we can too.
Somewhere there's a thrilling tale to be told about glimpses and sightings of one of America's rarest birds.
It's probably still in the swamp.
An important fact that helps gain insight into this book? No. But it's about as interesting as the book itself.
In America, there is a bird. It's the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker. It may or may not be extinct.
Tim Gallagher has become obsessed with said bird. He thinks it might still exist.
And so he sets out to find it.
Only, that's only a third of the book.
The rest is a sweet, cutesy, folksy, amble through the past looking at all the previous possible sightings and who may or may not have made them.
Essentially it's a history of possible sightings.
The mystery of the continued existence of this birder holy grail is blown on the front cover, so once you've started you're basically waiting for the big pay off.
Which never comes.
The final, conclusive, sightings and recordings are delivered with such a lack of fanfare (unfanfare?) that you have to wonder if it was even worth all those months staring at a tree in a swamp.
I'm certainly not sure it was worth reading about it.
But, that said, the book is well written. It's kind of entertaining, and Lord knows Gallagher doesn't leave a single thing out.
If he was going to meet a lot of tedious people and hang out with some of them in a canoe, then we can too.
Somewhere there's a thrilling tale to be told about glimpses and sightings of one of America's rarest birds.
It's probably still in the swamp.
February 20, 2022
Very interesting first-hand account of a birder's personal search for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. Gallagher started by speaking to everyone who had ever purported to see this supposedly extinct bird. He then followed one of the best leads and had his own sighting. His colleagues staged a huge search and found more evidence in the same area, leading the director of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology to declare that it was not extinct. (There's a nice hour and fifty minute video on YouTube of John Fitzpatrick presenting photos and videos of the hunt at a university in California.)
For some reason, I really enjoy woodpeckers so I've been interested in the fate of this particular bird. I liked hearing all of the details from Gallagher and he has me convinced that the Ivory-bills have managed to survive in small numbers and ideal habitat. I just wish someone would get some irrefutable GoPro video of one for all of us!
For some reason, I really enjoy woodpeckers so I've been interested in the fate of this particular bird. I liked hearing all of the details from Gallagher and he has me convinced that the Ivory-bills have managed to survive in small numbers and ideal habitat. I just wish someone would get some irrefutable GoPro video of one for all of us!
February 5, 2022
I've been on a books about birding jag recently and this book is a stand-out for its suspenseful narrative style and depictions of the colorful characters involved. As the title states, the author is interested in investigating whether there are any ivory-billed woodpeckers, a species presumed to be extinct for so long that those who claim they've seen one are ridiculed and treated as crackpots of the bigfoot-chasing kind. Gallagher relates the history of the birds, the horrors of their demise and then turns to the more recent sighting and the attempts to verify if it is possible they still exist. Along the way, we are introduced to the dreamers and skeptics who are trying to answer the question with certainty. CAUTION: skip the photos "bound" in the middle of the book until you've finished reading.
February 8, 2025
I enjoyed this book. It’s a fun romp through the swamp looking for an elusive (maybe extinct) woodpecker. I like birds and real life adventures, but knew nothing about the ivory bill until this book.
It is filled with fun stories of obsessed birders, dangerous cottonmouth snakes, and swampy southern wilderness. It also touched on the loss of wilderness and history’s passion for clear cutting of trees, which led to loss of habitat in the USA. It also wrote about the absurd past culture of ornithologists when they encountered a rare bird—shoot it and document it, instead of just studying it.
So modern day—is the ivory bill very reclusive but still hanging on in remote wilderness by a thread? I like to think so after reading this book. Sure, there have been big foot sightings but I think the people who have claimed to see the ivory bill are a bit more credible.
It is filled with fun stories of obsessed birders, dangerous cottonmouth snakes, and swampy southern wilderness. It also touched on the loss of wilderness and history’s passion for clear cutting of trees, which led to loss of habitat in the USA. It also wrote about the absurd past culture of ornithologists when they encountered a rare bird—shoot it and document it, instead of just studying it.
So modern day—is the ivory bill very reclusive but still hanging on in remote wilderness by a thread? I like to think so after reading this book. Sure, there have been big foot sightings but I think the people who have claimed to see the ivory bill are a bit more credible.
July 18, 2025
I accidentally stumbled on a Ivory-Billed Woodpecker Facebook group. I knew next to nothing about the birds, and was intrigued. After following along for a while, I asked what book to read as an introduction. This was the book most recommended.
The writing style kept me engaged. I found it very interesting. My biggest problem was keeping track of everyone. There were so many people Gallagher would bring up (some with similar names). He starts off by giving the history and then introducing us to all the possible sightings and who saw them. more than 100 of pages later, when these were individually brought up again, I had no recollection of who was who or what had happened at each particular sighting. That was the part of this book that frustrated me. I couldn't keep track of everyone
The writing style kept me engaged. I found it very interesting. My biggest problem was keeping track of everyone. There were so many people Gallagher would bring up (some with similar names). He starts off by giving the history and then introducing us to all the possible sightings and who saw them. more than 100 of pages later, when these were individually brought up again, I had no recollection of who was who or what had happened at each particular sighting. That was the part of this book that frustrated me. I couldn't keep track of everyone
August 27, 2018
Fantastic overview of one species of bird. The sources in the back are also appreciated. If you want to know the modern history of the ivory-billed woodpecker, this book is a must. I love science writing and storytelling so I found this very interesting. The last half can be extremely repetitive but is still interesting. I've always been fascinated by extinct birds and other animals. It makes me want to do more research. It also has a major portion of the story set in Ithaca, NY where my family is from and where I went to college so it has a special place in my heart for multiple reasons. Glad I read this.
October 15, 2019
I really enjoyed READING this (could not find it on audio). It made me sad to visualize the loss of the cypress trees. I do not know how I missed the 2005 articles describing the story
I thank the author and the other master birders for being so vigilant. And, took the warnings of copperheads very seriously - as in count me out.
This may be like another favorite - Kingbird Highway - that I will be careful who I recommend it to and limit to friends who are also birders.
Well written and I really enjoyed the look at historic birders and the importance of the field of research and documentation.
I thank the author and the other master birders for being so vigilant. And, took the warnings of copperheads very seriously - as in count me out.
This may be like another favorite - Kingbird Highway - that I will be careful who I recommend it to and limit to friends who are also birders.
Well written and I really enjoyed the look at historic birders and the importance of the field of research and documentation.
June 9, 2024
I'd never heard of the ivory-billed woodpecker before my sister gave me this book. The research & re-discovery documented in the book were interesting, but there were far too many unnecessary details (I could care less how many times the author stopped at McDonald's/Taco Bell, for example). But honestly, the book probably lost the most points when the author said "This was not just a twenty-four-hour birding marathon but day after day of the toughest physical and mental exertion imaginable..." Yeah, no. I think he was taking himself just a little too seriously. But overall, it was an interesting and informative read.
May 22, 2022
I believe Tim Gallagher.
“What happened to the vast bottomland forests of the South
during the past 150 years is one of the greatest environmental tragedies in the history of the United States, and few people know about it. These are still one of our most neglected and abused habitats. Nothing symbolizes what we have lost more than the ivory-billed woodpecker. Just to think that this bird has made it into the twenty-first century gives me chills. It's as though a funeral shroud has been pulled back, giving us a brief glimpse of a living bird, rising like Lazarus from the grave.”
“What happened to the vast bottomland forests of the South
during the past 150 years is one of the greatest environmental tragedies in the history of the United States, and few people know about it. These are still one of our most neglected and abused habitats. Nothing symbolizes what we have lost more than the ivory-billed woodpecker. Just to think that this bird has made it into the twenty-first century gives me chills. It's as though a funeral shroud has been pulled back, giving us a brief glimpse of a living bird, rising like Lazarus from the grave.”
December 30, 2021
I picked this up after the US Fish and Wildlife Service announced in September 2021 that Ivory-billed Woodpeckers were extinct. After reading this I'm convinced they're not. Tim is an excellent storyteller if a bit rambling at times. This felt less like reading a book and more like sitting down over coffee and listening to a friend tell me a story. What I'm really after is an in-between how did they go from being on a verge of rediscovery to confident enough to declare extinction?
January 18, 2024
This was a well-written, adventure-filled book about the 2004-05 efforts to document a bird species that’s presumed to be extinct - the ivory-billed woodpecker. This was an intriguing read, but I really appreciated it because it changed my outlook on the ivory-billed woodpecker debate that’s currently engulfed the ornithology world
May 23, 2021
Interesting topic. The subject matter was all new territory for me - birding, chasing down a possibly extinct species, the devastation of the old growth forests in the South - and this was an easy entree into all of it.
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