Ivory-billed Woodpecker

The ivory-bill was the largest woodpecker in the United States, and one of the largest in the world. Naturalist John James Audubon described it as the "Great chieftain of the woodpecker tribe". In adults, the bill is ivory in color, hence the species' common name, and the plumage is deep black and white, with a red crest in males.

The bird was commonly found in bottomland hardwood forests, including dense swampland, and in temperate coniferous forests. Its diet consists of large beetle larvae, particularly wood-boring Cerambycidae beetles, supplemented by vegetable matter, including southern magnolia, pecans, acorns, hickory nuts, wild grapes, and persimmons. To hunt beetle larvae, the bird wedges bark from dead trees using its bill, exposing the larvae tunnels; within its range, the ivory-bill faces no real competitor in hunting these larvae.