Bird Table News

I have a Great Spotted  Woodpecker visiting my peanut feeder.  It’s amazing to watch such a colourful bird as such close quarters.

Description

I’ve been able to watch this woodpecker closely.

  It’s black and white with a red patch under it’s tail.  It also has a red patch on the top of it’s head and this means the one I have seen is a male woodpecker.

Food

Woodpeckers eat insects that live on and under the bark of trees. They also live on seeds and berries - and peanuts. 

 Nest

The woodpecker’s nest is dug out in the shape of a bottle inside old dead tree trunks and the bottom is covered with soft wood shavings.  The entrance to the nest is round.

Eggs

Eggs are creamy coloured and the mother lays them during the month of May.  Both male and females woodpeckers sit on the eggs to incubate them.

Interesting Facts

In late January the Woodpecker starts to make a drumming sound as it beats its bill against a tree.  This drumming sound can carry a long  way.  In this case the woodpecker is not trying to find food, but is marking out it’s territory.  The Great Spotted woodpecker can beat it’s beak against bark or  a tree trunk  11 times a second.  At this time of the year it is not making a hole in a tree, but using the tree as a musical instrument to reverberate sound round the wood to show its territorial area.

Woodpeckers also make a noise when they are making a hole in a tree or trying to get at beetle larvae.  This noise is a very different.  The beats the woodpecker makes are a lot slower and they sound harder, like the blows from a hammer.  This sound can be heard any time of the year.

I saw this woodpecker a month ago

Tags: woodpecker