Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Juvenile Pileated Woodpecker near falls







This guy (could be a young female too) was incredible. Females also has a red tuft on their heads in this species of woodpecker.  Born summer 2008, he is already an excellent grub hunter. He worked a sycamore tree for about 20 minutes, peering in every hole, digging out the bark and leaves and finding many nice sized grubs. He (she) sometimes sent down a shower of sycamore dust and bark; then I saw dried leaves coming down too and realized he was just cleaning out all the holes in the tree. The call was adult and he called out about every 5 minutes. As you can see, he is not fully mature yet; smaller in size, less white feathering, and a not so cool "tuft". Taken with a Canon 5D and Canon 400mm f5.6 lens hand held. Click to enlarge.

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