U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service will soon decide whether to terminate federal protections for giant ivory-billed woodpeckers, due to lack of definitive evidence revealing the species continues to persist in remote forested swamps of eastern Arkansas and northern Louisiana.
Federal Extinction Declaration Decision for Ivory-Billed Woodpeckers Imminent
![A male ivory-billed woodpecker clings to a cavity nest carved into a tree in a Louisiana forest, April 13,1935.](https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/b9510f1/2147483647/strip/true/crop/1280x1038+0+0/resize/880x714!/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F9b%2F46%2F9391c33746bba5903f7582d92f0b%2Fmale-ibwo-cornell-lab.jpeg)
Arthur A. Allen/Macaulay Library
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Courtesy Cornell Lab of Ornithology