weather woes

The cold front that has dumped snow over the Midwest just brought us flurries and cold temperatures here in central Ohio, but still put a damper on birding. I managed to get out late Sunday afternoon, with the goal being locating a Pileated Woodpecker for my year list. Unfortunately I struck out on that bird, but did see a Hermit Thrush and a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker.

I've been following Michael Collin's Pearl River Ivory-billed Woodpecker page for a while (fishcrow.com) - he has a couple of blurry videos of what he says is an Ivorybill. I'm pretty sure he's seen the bird, but he's been stymied by low quality video that is hard to interpret from an outside perspective. I personally think that Mr. Collins should gracefully accept that his video is not going to convince anyone and keep the focus on acquiring a definitive image. He does have pretty good ideas for the search, such as mounting a camera on the midpoint of his kayak paddle, which means he can react very quickly to a sighting and record it. I wish him all the luck in the world in his quest, but I also hope he can tone down his rhetoric without losing his passion.