DOWNY WOODPECKER GALLERY
(Dryobates pubescens)
eBird provides this description of the Downy Woodpecker: Tiny. Widespread and familiar woodland resident and backyard visitor. Its black-and-white plumage is nearly identical to larger Hairy Woodpecker, but note short bill (shorter than the head) and black markings on white outer tail feathers. Readily visits feeders, especially for suet. Nests in cavities.
I was delighted to see and photograph a Downy Woodpecker at Sabine Woods on the late afternoon of April 27, 2020. I had heard the bird pecking while sitting at the central drip blind and decided to see if I could track it down, and I did! The bird was very high up on a dead tree so my photos are marginal, but I was happy to be able to see and hear this pretty little bird!
Here is a short video of the Downy Woodpecker at Sabine Woods. You can hear the sounds of his pecking that led me to him…
“Cool Facts” About The Downy Woodpecker From All About Birds…
- In winter Downy Woodpeckers are frequent members of mixed species flocks. Advantages of flocking include having to spend less time watching out for predators and better luck finding food from having other birds around.
- Male and female Downy Woodpeckers divide up where they look for food in winter. Males feed more on small branches and weed stems, and females feed on larger branches and trunks. Males keep females from foraging in the more productive spots. When researchers have removed males from a woodlot, females have responded by feeding along smaller branches.
- The Downy Woodpecker eats foods that larger woodpeckers cannot reach, such as insects living on or in the stems of weeds. You may see them hammering at goldenrod galls to extract the fly larvae inside.
- Woodpeckers don’t sing songs, but they drum loudly against pieces of wood or metal to achieve the same effect. People sometimes think this drumming is part of the birds’ feeding habits, but it isn’t. In fact, feeding birds make surprisingly little noise even when they’re digging vigorously into wood.
- Downy Woodpeckers have been discovered nesting inside the walls of buildings.
- The oldest known Downy Woodpecker was a male and at least 11 years, 11 months old when he was recaptured and rereleased in 1996 during banding operations in California. He had been banded in the same state in 1985.