Monday, April 6, 2015

"Search for the Rare Ivorybill"

When I first began reading this article by Don Eckleberry I felt sadness. It was as if I was looking at a series of chronological events of how and why this bird became either extinct or extremely rare. While the beginning of the article was mainly factual and at times  a little dry the author kept me interested by making me believe that I would find out what happened to this bird. Eventually it was evident that the beginning was merely background informaiton that was essential to the article. As the article progressed the author showed more and more of his passion and interest in finding this last known Ivorybill. It wasn't until the author wrote, "She came trumpeting in to the roost, her big wings, cleaving the air in strong, direct flight, and she alighted with one magnificent upward swoop." that I saw hope in Eckleberry's writing. Before the tone of the article seemed almost skeptic, like the author wanted to believe that he would see this amazing bird but he wasn't quite sure it would happen. However, after the author caught a glimpse of the bird his whole demeanor in the article changed. Eckleberry began more descriptive and his expressive tone even gave me hope that this rare bird had a future.
However, after finishing this article it seems that this bird is more of a myth to some people. There have been reports that this bird is living in other areas but there really hasn't been much information to back up any claims. What makes this article the most difficult to take in is the fact that they worked so hard and talked to so many people about conserving this bird but in the end it was the logging companies that wouldn't agree. A person would think that with the President of the United States on board with a conservation project the logging company would be more than willing to cooperate. Our blog leader, Stephanie, brought up a good question about what would you do with this call for action. It is amazing to me that people are willing to sacrifice part of their lives in order to help protect an animal they barely know about. I don't think I could drop everything in my life to chase after an animal that might be there. It is inspiring to see that there are still people in the world willing to do anything in order to protect or save something just because it is the right thing to do not because it benefits their own wants.

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