All About Downy Woodpeckers and more

Last night I stopped by to visit friends, Gerald and Jill, and some of their relatives who have arrived early for the July 4th celebration.  While I was sitting in their yard a downy woodpecker visited their feeders.  Apparently he is a frequent visitor.  Here is the one photo that I was able to get of this fast moving forager.

According to the website http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Downy_Woodpecker/id : "The active little Downy Woodpecker is a familiar sight at backyard feeders and in parks and woodlots, where it joins flocks of chickadees and nuthatches, barely out sizing them. An often acrobatic forager, this black-and-white woodpecker is at home on tiny branches or balancing on slender plant galls, sycamore seed balls, and suet feeders....Downy Woodpeckers are small versions of the classic woodpecker body plan. They have a straight, chisel-like bill, blocky head, wide shoulders, and straight-backed posture as they lean away from tree limbs and onto their tail feathers. The bill tends to look smaller for the bird’s size than in other woodpeckers.

Downy Woodpeckers give a checkered black-and-white impression. The black upper parts are checked with white on the wings, the head is boldly striped, and the back has a broad white stripe down the center. Males have a small red patch on the back of the head. The outer tail feathers are typically white with a few black spots.

Downy Woodpeckers hitch around tree limbs and trunks or drop into tall weeds to feed on galls, moving more acrobatically than larger woodpeckers. Their rising-and-falling flight style is distinctive of many woodpeckers. In spring and summer, Downy Woodpeckers make lots of noise, both with their shrill whinnying call and by drumming on trees."

Downy woodpeckers can be seen throughout most of North America.

More information and facts about the Downy Woodpecker is included from:
http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/downy_woodpecker/lifehistory :

Cool Facts

• 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 lived to be at least 11 years 11 months old.

Downy Woodpeckers eat mainly insects, including beetle larvae that live inside wood or tree bark as well as ants and caterpillars. They eat pest insects including corn earworm, tent caterpillars, bark beetles, and apple borers. About a quarter of their diet consists of plant material, particularly berries, acorns, and grains. Downy Woodpeckers are common feeder birds, eating suet and black oil sunflower seeds and occasionally drinking from hummingbird feeders.

 

Both male and female excavate the nest hole, a job that takes 1 to 3 weeks. Entrance holes are round and 1-1.5 inches across. Cavities are 6-12 inches deep and widen toward the bottom to make room for eggs and the incubating bird. The cavity is lined only with wood chips.

 

Downy Woodpeckers are numerous and their populations have increased since 1966, according to the North American Breeding Bird Survey. Partners in Flight estimates the global breeding population at 14 million, with 79 percent living in the U.S., and 21 percent in Canada.  

 

Nesting Facts

Clutch Size

3–8 eggs

Number of Broods

1 broods

Egg Length

0.7–0.8 in
1.9–2 cm

Egg Width

0.6–0.6 in
1.4–1.5 cm

Incubation Period

12 days

Nestling Period

18–21 days

Egg Description

Completely white.

Condition at Hatching

Naked, pink skin, a sharp egg tooth at the tip of bill; eyes closed, clumsy.

This large moth was resting on one of my screens.

Finally, here is an updated photo of the front of the museum, featuring the new bench.

CITES:
Dick Daniels, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Downy_Woodpecker_RWD.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/noelzialee/ from http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Picoides_pubescens_male.jpg?uselang=en-gb