Food: wood-boring larvae, moths, beetles, ants, aphids, spiders, poison ivy and dogwood fruits, berries, corn, apples, and acorns. The downy woodpecker forages trees and limbs but will also forage woody weeds and shrubs for insects. The habitat for this smallest of Pennsylvania’s woodpeckers is open forests of mixed growth, orchards, suburbs, urban woodlots and parks. Nests are usually dug in rotting wood, 3 to 50 feet above the ground and often on the underside of an exposed limb. Eggs: three to six, usually four or five, incubated 12 days.
The downy woodpecker is a common resident in all seasons. In winter, it can often be found in fields with dried corn stalks or visiting suet feeders. Calls: a soft pik and a rattling sound that starts slowly and speeds up at the end, trailing off. The drumming sound is slower than the hairy woodpecker, slow enough to count the taps.
Larger size and a proportionately longer, heavier bill distinguishes it from the downy woodpecker. The hairy woodpecker eats mostly insects and prefers wood-boring beetle larvae, ants, caterpillars, bark beetles and moth pupae. It also dines on spiders, caterpillars, bees, wasps and millipedes; also seeds and fruits and backyard suet and seed feeders. Primary habitat is forest land with a preference for large tracts of forest with mature trees, deciduous or conifer. It is more likely found in extensive mature forests than its smaller relative, the downy woodpecker. They may be found in wooded swamps and around beaver ponds, woodlots and wooded parks, suburbs and cemeteries. Nest: 5 to 30 feet up with an inch-and-a-half wide hole leading to an 8 to 12-inch deep cavity; the male may also dig a roosting cavity. Eggs: three to six, commonly four, with a 12-day incubation period.
The hairy woodpecker is found throughout much of North America to northern Canada from Alaska to Newfoundland and south through parts of Mexico to Central America. In Pennsylvania, it is a fairly common year-round resident. The contact call of a hairy woodpecker, a loud keek, is actually higher pitched than the downy woodpecker’s call note, and its rattling call is a rolling series of notes on one pitch and does not trail off at the end as does the rattle call of its smaller relative.
This often is the bird reported by people who do not realize that it is a woodpecker because it does not have a black-and-white plumage like other woodpeckers. The eastern population of northern flicker is known as “yellow-shafted” flicker because of the color of its wing feather shafts which translate into prominent yellow underwing markings. In flight, the white rump patch and yellow underwings are very prominent. The male has a black “mustache” mark extending from the bill back onto the throat. Flickers are often seen on the ground or on sidewalks eating ants, a preferred food. Their saliva neutralizes the formic acid which ants contain. They also eat beetles, grasshoppers, crickets, flies, moths, butterflies and snails. In fall and winter, they eat poison ivy fruits, dogwood berries, wild cherries, berries, corn and staghorn sumac seeds. Favored habitat is open woodlands and forest edges, orchards, woodlots and yards or fields with scattered trees. They can often be found in timbered areas where there are some snags and large trees remaining. The nest is a hole opening into a cavity, generally 6 to 15 feet up a tree, sometimes higher. The cavity takes up to two weeks to build. Flickers also will use nest boxes that are the same size those built for screech owls or wood ducks. Eggs: usually five to eight, with an 11- to 13-day incubation period. Aggressive European starlings may drive flickers out of their newly-dug cavities.
According to Breeding Bird Surveys since the mid-1900s, the northern flicker is in significant decline in eastern North America including Pennsylvania. Researchers believe loss of habitat is a contributing factor for the declines, but there may be other unknown forces at play. Flickers are considered “partial migrants” because some persist in winter and some may not migrate very far from their nesting grounds. In spring, flickers are common migrants from late March through April; in summer, breeding residents. They breed across North America from Alaska to Newfoundland south to the Gulf States and into areas of Mexico and Central America. In fall, flickers are common September or October migrants; and in winter, rare to locally common residents. Flickers winter principally in the southern U.S. Call: a loud flick or flicker, two to seven times per minute; also a shrill, descending kee-oo. The flicker or wicka call gives this woodpecker its name. Their drumming and calling can be particularly prominent because they often choose snags and trees out in the open for their displays and vocalizations.
Flight is strong, with irregular wing flapping accompanied by white flashing of wing undersurfaces. Foods include primarily wood-dwelling ants and beetles, wood-boring larvae and wild nuts and fruits such as sassafras, sumac and dogwood berries, greenbriers, spicebush, blackberries and elderberries. Pileated woodpeckers inhabit mature deciduous forests or mixed deciduous- coniferous forest. Suitable forest habitat must include large trees for nesting cavities. In recent decades, it is increasingly more likely to see a pileated woodpecker flying across an open landscape to forage in a hedgerow or woodlot distant from a large forest block. Pairs stay on and defend the same territory year-round. Nest: a new hole excavated each year in the same nest area, 15 to 70 feet high in a tree (average 45 feet). The entrance hole is usually oval, and the cavity is 10 to 24 inches deep. Eggs: three to five, incubated 18 days.
These birds are common residents in all seasons. Due to forest felling and shooting, the species was an uncommon sight during the first half of the twentieth century. With forest regrowth and protection, the species has returned and recovered. They do not migrate but breed throughout forested areas of the eastern U.S., in regions of the Midwest and western U.S. and across southern Canada. A pileated woodpecker’s powerful beak can break loose fist-sized chunks of wood; the bird twists its head and beak as it strikes to add leverage. Pileateds cut large rectangular holes in standing dead trees as well as fallen logs exposing the tunnels of insect prey. They drum loudly and rapidly, then more slowly, trailing off softly at the end. Call: cuk-cuk-cuk-cuk-cuk, in a series; also wuk-wuk-wuk-wuk-wuk.
Because of their large and extensive excavations, pileated woodpeckers provide nesting and roosting cavities for a host of species including owls, ducks, swifts, kestrels, squirrels and bats.
Like the flicker, the red- headed woodpecker does a lot of feeding on the ground but is an expert flycatcher, snatching insects in flight. It eats beetles, cicadas, bees, ants, grasshoppers, caterpillars and other insects. The red-headed woodpecker is highly omnivorous with about two-thirds of its diet consisting of plant matter including acorns, beech nuts, corn, seeds, wild and cultivated fruits and berries. Redheads store food in tree cavities during winter. They wedge nuts, seeds or insects, including live grasshoppers, into cracks and crevices or under bark and are known to cover their cache with wood and bark pieces. They defend these food caches against squirrels and other birds and are highly dependent on a cached acorn supply during winter. Habitat is open forest and woodland with the important components of dead and dying trees and limbs, nut-producing trees and open areas to forage for flying insects. Red-headed woodpecker habitat can be found in farm woodlots, oak or beech groves, orchards, river bottoms, forest edges, beaver swamps, burned over forests, towns, golf courses, hedgerows and parks. This bird often perches in the open. Its habit of flying low from tree to tree may make it vulnerable to collisions with vehicles. Nest: 8 to 80 feet up, often in an oak and occasionally in a fence post or utility pole. Eggs: 3 to 10, usually five, with a 12- to 14-day incubation period. In spring, the redhead is an uncommon migrant in late April and early May; in summer, a breeding resident; in fall, an uncommon migrant from September to early November: and a winter resident. Call is a raucous tchur.
The red-headed woodpecker has declined range-wide at an average of 2.4 percent per year between 1966 and 2015, as measured by Breeding Bird Surveys. It is designated as a Species of Greatest Conservation Need in the Pennsylvania State Wildlife Action Plan. In Pennsylvania, there was a decline of 46 percent in the number of blocks recording red- headed woodpeckers between the first Atlas of Breeding Bird Pennsylvania (1983-89) and the second Atlas (2004-09). Its range contracted from the northern half of the state with the exception of the northwest counties. It is most abundant in southcentral counties near the Mason-Dixon Line
Sapsuckers inhabit second growth deciduous (particularly northern hardwood) and mixed conifer forests. They are found in open woodland, forest edges, orchards, and woodlots. In Pennsylvania, they occur across the northern tier and in scattered mountainous areas in the southern two-thirds of the state. This species has increased by 62 percent over the last several decades according to reports from the Second Atlas of Breeding Birds in Pennsylvania and now is the most common nesting woodpecker in many northern woods of the state. Nest: a gourd-shaped cavity excavated 8 to 40 feet up a tree; aspen, red maple and other softer woods and trees afflicted with tinder fungus are often chosen as nest sites, because the fungus creates a soft center that is easily dug out. Eggs: four to seven, usually five or six, with a 12- to 13-day incubation period.
The sapsucker is the most migratory of Pennsylvania’s woodpeckers. In spring, it is a common April migrant; in summer, a rare breeding resident (breeds mainly across the northern U.S. and southern Canada); in fall, a common migrant in September and October; and in winter a rare resident, as most individuals move further south. Immature sapsuckers are the most likely winter visitors, often found in Christmas Bird Counts or backyard surveys. Call is a jay-like mewing note. Also, sapsuckers tap in a distinctive rhythm, two or three series per minute, more of a tapping than the typical drumming of other species.