Finding the Grail

The Grail Bird: Hot on the Trail of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker is one of those books that shifts direction dramatically as you’re reading it. After starting with a concise (and appalling) history of the ivory-bill woodpecker’s decline and disappearance, author Tim Gallagher introduces us to a colorful group of people who claim to have seen the big bird, despite the fact that it was supposed to be extinct. In true New Journalism fashion, Gallagher doesn’t just talk to his subjects – he goes out birding with them, and the entertaining story that results is as much about his misadventures driving around the Deep South and sloshing through bayous as about the people he’s interviewing. But on one of these trips through the middle of some trackless swamp, something unexpected happened – he saw one.

After the sighting, the book shifts gears. Where the first two-thirds are devoted to portraits of the people who made unconfirmed sightings, the last third focuses on events, specifically, what happens after Gallagher convinces his colleagues at Cornell’s Lab of Ornithology that he’s really seen the “grail bird.” The two parts are barely stitched together, but Gallagher’s enthusiasm and clear prose carries through as a large set of new characters descend on the swamp to get proof that the ivory-bill still lives. And at long last, I’ve found a book about current events that I actually  enjoyed reading.

The Grail Bird: Hot on the Trail of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker
Tim Gallagher
Houghton Mifflin
$25.00

Comments

[Paul Tomblin]

That little snippet of video doesn't convince me. It could very easily be a Pileated.

[DianeAKelly]

Personal confession time -- I've never been very good at identifying birds. I probably wouldn't be able to spot an ivory-bill if it paraded around right in front of me. I do know some ornithologists who think the Cornell team has good evidence to support their claim. I also know that there are other ornithologists who don't think anything's been proved yet. But the LofO is heading back into the field. We'll see what they come back with!