Arthur Allen's Ivory-bills

A portfolio of images by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s esteemed founder

It amazes me to think how long the Cornell Lab of Ornithology has been involved in studying the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. Pioneering ornithologist Arthur A. Allen, who founded the Lab, located his first pair of ivory-bills in 1924 in a Florida cypress swamp. Even at that early date, many scientists already believed the species was extinct. Allen went on to study and photograph the ivory-bill at Louisiana's Singer Tract in 1935. We are pleased to present a portfolio of his historic images on these pages.—Tim Gallagher

A male (left) and a female Ivory-billed Woodpecker exchange incubation duties at a nest in the famed Singer Tract—what was then an 80,000-acre remnant of primeval swamp forest in northeastern Louisiana.

Arthur A. Allen (above) led a Cornell expedition there in 1935 and produced the first motion pictures and sound recordings of this critically rare species.

more of Arthur Allen's photos (page 2 of 3)

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