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It is hard to imagine any birder not liking woodpeckers – they are the “motherhood and apple pie” of the avian world. The Bearded Woodpecker (Mkuze, South Africa) does not really look any more bearded than many other woodpeckers. It is the most widespread woodpecker in Africa, claims the HBW.
The exploration of triads within the avifauna of Trinidad and Tobago has taken me through various families and species groups on this blog. On the smaller island of Tobago there are three species of woodpeckers and three species of woodcreepers – one of each is found on Tobago but not Trinidad. Golden-olive Woodpecker.
Enter the woodpecker. To be specific, the Red-bellied , Hairy , and Downy Woodpeckers , along with the White-breasted Nuthatch. This research suggests that the boom isn’t due to an influx of newcomers, but rather because more local birds are flourishing and successfully rearing families.
Disbelief probably seems like the proper response to the idea that there are woodpeckers in New York City. After all, woodpeckers peck on trees, not skyscrapers. But even birders might be surprised to learn that eight species of woodpecker have graced New York City’s five boroughs with their presence!
The Woodpeckers are one of the more popular of the avian families. What’s not to like about woodpeckers? Those woodpeckers are some smart-looking birds, and Costa Rica has her fair share with 16 species that head-bang from the dry forests of the northwest to the high-elevation rainforests of the mountains.
Short answer: The woodpecker is most likely not crazy and noshing on the house is not what the woodpecker has in mind. Woodpeckers could be pecking on homes for a variety of reasons, all of which can drive a non birder a bit batty. So, why do woodpeckers peck on human made structures?
This is a Green-barred Woodpecker , common and widespread throughout South America to the south of the Amazon River and to the east of the Andes. This form is thought to be a different species and the name Golden-bellied Woodpecker has been adopted by some.
Second of all, Lewis’s Woodpeckers are birds of the west and they rarely stray to New York State. So you can imagine our disappointment when we crawled out of the car after our trip to find out that Mike was in fact relaxing in the warm kitchen and had no idea where the woodpecker was! Why is that awesome?
Why would I call these beautiful woodpeckers the “clowns of the avian world?” ” Besides the facial features of the Acorn Woodpecker ( Melanerpes formicivorus ) appearing somewhat clown-like, they are a joy to watch and some of their antics are sure to bring a smile to anyone’s face. www.youtube.com/watch?
’s bird family tree in a new tab and follow along as you read. shocked everyone with a suggestion that passerines were most closely related not to woodpeckers and kingfishers but to parrots, falcons, and seriemas. In 2008, Nick Sly published a review of Hackett et al. titled Avian relationships – What do we know?
I had taken the short drive to the park to search for a family of American Dippers sighted near the visitor center by a fellow birder a few days before. As I got out of my car, about fifty feet from Manzanita Lake, I heard the loud drumming of a woodpecker. It was July of 2012. It was a cool 48 degrees.
Well, I never did see a Black-backed Woodpecker on my trip, but they were on my mind… What could be more straightforward than the naming of woodpeckers? The name woodpecker itself is a basic behavioral description. Here are birds that peck at wood. The exceptions are still mighty prosaic.
“Wait, why is this bird called ‘ Red-bellied Woodpecker ?'” So there’s a bunch of other woodpeckers named red-naped, red-cowled, red-shawled, that kind of thing? Other woodpeckers don’t have red bellies at all?”. “No, Lewis’s Woodpecker. “So Another is in the works. . Not really. ”. “So
The Sunda Pygmy Woodpecker – Yungipicus moluccensis is a tiny bird measuring only around 12-13cm and we observed it in parks, gardens and mangrove areas. Sunda Pygmy Woodpeckers could easily nip around the back of a tree trunk and be obscured, but I was able to capture some photos of this tiny bird.
Volunteer Moya Kinnealy reached in nearly to her elbow and removed four tiny Red-bellied Woodpeckers. Cutting one tree down displaced two very different wildlife families,” said Michele. The birds were living like city apartment dwellers … the upstairs neighbors were the woodpeckers, downstairs were the screech owls.
I am puzzled as to why Gulls and Terns are almost passed over, with less than two pages of text devoted to a family description and only six species accounts (four gulls, two terns). Family follows family with no page break, making this section a little dense. and three of the nine woodpeckers illustrated.
Woodpeckers are phenomenally well-represented in Colombia and the country holds anything from 42 to 44 of the world’s woodpecker species, depending on which list you follow. That’s over 20 % of all the woodpeckers found worldwide. Like the true woodpeckers, piculets share several traits common to the family.
Their taxonomic affinities have caused great confusion and debate amongst ornithologists; they were originally assigned to the thrush family, then Old World warblers before being shifted to babblers (the last mentioned a common dumping-ground for any aberrant passerines).
So birds like Blue Crane, Black Harrier, Drakensberg Rockjumper, Ground Woodpecker and Southern Bald Ibis were automatically withdrawn. I then had a list of 20 or so favorites and decided that, in order to get down to 10 birds, each bird needs to be in a different family. A male Knysna Woodpecker by Steve Davis 5.
Another cotinga that is arguably the most popular member of that family – for its voice more so than its looks – is the Screaming Piha. No question about it being a woodpecker – a most beautiful one at that! This Red-necked Woodpecker gave us a good look before gliding to a slightly further tree.
While crossing Gramos Mountain in northern Greece, a Dendrocopos woodpecker flew over the road and landed in a pine tree. I had two possibilities, an uncommon Middle Spotted or scarce White-backed Woodpecker – which would have been a lifer for me. One Grey-headed Woodpecker flies across the road – a promising start.
The month and this particular period is all the more auspicious for me and mine, as so many friends and families celebrate spring birthdays. My family took our annual post-Easter Egg hunt hike at Powder Mills Park, where I spied several gorgeous matched pairs of Wood Ducks along with lots of different woodpecker species.
Old beech forests are inhabited by Grey-headed Woodpecker , Eurasian Green Woodpecker , Black Woodpecker , White-backed Woodpecker (rare), Stock Dove (uncommon), Collared Flycatcher , Red-breasted Flycatcher (rare), Marsh Tit and Coal Tit. Above them, on limestone cliffs, Alpine Swift and Crag Martin breed.
In the 1960s, Efraín Chacón constructed a dirt trail [from San Gerardo de Dota] to the Pan-American Highway, and brought his family to build a house, to farm and fish for trout. Volcano Hummingbird male, Talamanca race There is a bit of history attached to the status of the most popular birding area in Talamanca. “In
I suspect that this finch belongs to the Woodpeckerfamily from the shape of the beak but I welcome any other comments. When he landed on the tree his woodpecker behavior became a little more apparent and his beak shape convinced me of his type. I found him near “Los Gemelos” at approximate 600 m.a.s.l. on Santa Cruz Island.
The Groove-billed Ani is an odd-looking member of the Cuckoo family. Golden-fronted Woodpeckers are exceedingly common here, both in the city and in the countryside. The characteristic calls of the Ladder-backed Woodpecker can be heard anywhere that there aren’t too many people. They are residents, but not common ones.
Trogons and quetzals are an ancient, colorful bird family that occurs in forests and other wooded habitats from the American tropics to Africa to Southeast Asia. Bright and sociable, Green Jays are a joy to watch as they move around wooded habitats in tight family flocks in search of large insects, seed, and fruit.
But Corey also hit up the Forest Park bird feeders with his family Saturday afternoon and Desi, his five-year-old, was so taken with a Red-bellied Woodpecker (the one above) that Corey had to choose it as his favorite bird of the weekend too. How about you? What was your best bird of the weekend?
There are few families of birds as bewitching as the birds-of-paradise. There are, however, two species that are more accesible than the rest of the family. I’ve written before about how satisfying I find locating new families , and this was a pretty sweet new family to get. www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VGongXYDGo
By contrast, the Lineated Woodpecker is not only resident, but wears the same outfit all year. So too does the Crimson-crested Woodpecker. Let this Roseate Tern represent all terns that (even for a brief period) share this coloration. A good eye-to-eye might be necessary to understand why this Great Antshrike is included on this list.
But the Golden-cheeked Woodpecker (in this case, a female) is a strictly Hot Country species, replaced by the closely-related Golden-fronted Woodpecker up where we live. Here in Michoacán, we have four different species from the Myiarchus genus of the Tyrant-Flycatcher family.
The northern half of the lake added Corn Bunting , European Turtle Dove , Dalmatian Pelican , Purple Heron , Eurasian Hobby , Eurasian Golden Oriole , Eurasian Green Woodpecker , and only the first of the several Masked Shrikes of the tour (cover photo by Kostas Papadopoulos).
A family of endangered Wattled Cranes might be a highlight of the lower sections of the Sani Pass road, by Adam Riley. Buff-streaked Chats and Cape Rock-Thrushes sing from boulder tops, and family huddles of Ground Woodpeckers emit their rather gull-like shrieks. Photo by Adam Riley.
Among our highlights were 5 doves species, a full 9 hummingbirds, 6 herons/egrets, 3 hawks and 2 falcons, 4 woodpeckers, all of 12 Tyrant Flycatchers, 3 vireos, 6 New World Sparrows, 4 New World Orioles in different shades of orange, 16 New World Warblers, 2 tanagers, and 6 grosbeaks and buntings.
At least I didn’t have to travel far for great birds; my whole family thrilled to the sight of an adult Sharp-shinned Hawk chowing down on an unspecified rodent in our yard. Corey enjoyed his weekend at his parents’ house in the Hudson Valley though he didn’t see too many birds.
So much so that the two species are placed within their own family, Chaetopidae. And then there are the Ground Woodpeckers ! These are one of only three ground-dwelling woodpeckers in the world. A Ground Woodpecker by Adam Riley But probably the very best attribute of this gem of a birding spot is its proximity to the ocean.
Hoffmann’s Woodpecker. This beautiful woodpecker does very well in edge habitats and is the common, expected species in the Central Valley and dry areas of the Pacific slope. Keep looking and you might see some other members of this glittering, fast-paced family. You’ll find them in other types of edge habitats too.
This is where Gila Woodpecker and Yellow-breasted Chat meet Squirrel Cuckoo , Bat Falcon , and Black-throated Magpie-Jay. In the mean time, a family group of Black-throated Magpie-Jays were frolicking in the breeze high over the dry valley, showing off their exorbitantly long tail streamers.
But Swarovski Optik is a family-owned business, so the then CEO, Mr. Swarovski, categorically rejected the advice and decided: factory stays in Austria, and the prices will only go up! At the end of the 20th century (and before the ELs were born), the factory hired consultants to help it restructure and maximise profits.
In the same way, all of central Michoacán’s woodpeckers are black and white and red all over. I knew coastal Mexico had greenish woodpeckers , but I had never seen one. Never, that is, until this day, when I met the Golden-olive Woodpecker. And who wouldn’t want to see a member of the toucan family?
I love her Carolina Wrens , her Piping Plovers , her Chimney Swifts , her Ivory-billed Woodpeckers , and her Phoebes, both avian and human. The book is loaded with Julie’s art from rough sketches, often helpfully captioned in Julie’s own handwriting, to full-color, full-page reproductions of her wonderful watercolors.
Taxonomically, swallows are one of the few families of birds that has seen little change in its ranks. For centuries, it seems that ornithologists and naturalists have correctly pegged swallows to the right family. The family is global in its distribution, with 83 species of around 19 genera. Purple Martin , Progne subis.
There are even some warblers that look a bit less anonymous than the majority of the family. Nanhui does not regularly have any woodpeckers except for the Wryneck , which can be found on migration. Witness the. Rufous-faced Warbler … … and Sulphur-bellied Warbler. Narcissus Flycatcher. Blue-and-White Flycatcher.
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