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Re: Bird book -- good reading!



Hello all,
A pileated flew over my head - less than 20 feet- on Big Woods Road  at the
entrance to the Ranger Station Sunday. Awesome, indeed, and also magical and
somewhat primitive!

Carol Williamson
Durham, NC
carolw@sandler-recht.com

Paula Jeannet wrote:

> Just finished a pretty good read which I thought I'd mention to you-all.
> The title is "Hope is the Thing With Feathers: A Personal History of
> Vanished Birds," and it's written by Christopher Cokinos, published this
> year. (The first part is a quote from Emily Dickinson.) It gives for the
> first time as many details as possible (with some room for sentimental
> conjecture, too!) about the demise of certain birds of North America: the
> Heath Hen, the Carolina Parakeet, the Passenger Pigeon, the flightless
> Auk, the Labrador Duck, and the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker. As the title
> implies, it's a very personalized history, a saga of one person's
> commitment to documenting the lives of these birds and their tragic ends,
> largely forgotten today. A very moving book that took him ten years to
> research and write. I'm so glad he wrote it.
>
> It came to my mind suddenly as a I read the posts lately about rails and
> the destruction of habitat. It's frightening to contemplate that even
> though we have as a race gotten somewhat better at not slaughtering
> animals into oblivion, the disappearing acts are still happening under
> our very noses...
>
> By the way, does anyone know if there have been any other claimed
> sightings of Ivory-Billed Woodpeckers since the last ones I know about
> (1960s?)? Apparently they were also known as the "Lord God Bird" since
> anyone who was lucky enough to see one might be heard to say, "Lord God!!"
> :-)
> The first time I saw a Pileated (near West Point on the Eno, one early
> morning) I had somewhat the same feeling of awe...
>
> Cheers,
> Paula Mangiafico
> Durham, NC