Red-headed Woodpecker Behavior

Red-headed Woodpecker

You learn something new every day. Most of it is not worth knowing. This is:

I was at Colliers Mills this morning, and as I do almost every time I go, I headed first to the woods north of Success Road to look for Red-headed Woodpeckers. They aren't hard to find, usually, though sometimes I have to cheat and play a recording of their "queer!" cry. Today, though, I was just standing at the edge of the woods when I heard a pecking above me and there was a beautiful adult (they breed there so sometimes you get a motley juvenile) on the side of a thin, dead tree. Its head was lit up brilliantly by the rising sun. And when I took my camera off my shoulder and it slid around out of sight, I realized I had to add to the Laws of Birding:

    #7 No matter where you stand, the woodpecker is always on the other side of the tree.

The woodpecker played hide and seek with me for a few minutes and then came around to where I could see the majority of its body and in its beak was an acorn. Where did that come from? It could only be a cache. I didn't know that Red-headed Woodpeckers store food like Acorn Woodpeckers but looking it up I found that they do so and more elaborately and with more varied foods than the western species. 

Red-headed Woodpeckers are not social like Acorn Woodpeckers. They defend their cache vigorously and instead of having an open granary like Acorns Woodpeckers, they stuff little bits of wood in the hole where they've wedged the acorn (or other tree nut, or even an insect) in order to hide it. I remember out west seeing trees and even utility poles, stuffed with hundreds of acorns. The cover up with bits of wood explains why I've never seen a similar sight at Colliers Mills all the years I've been going there. Also, since it is not a family enterprise as it is with Acorn Woodpeckers, the behavior is much less obvious. Granted, I'm not the most observant naturalist, but this is the first time in 14 years of going to Colliers Mills that I've ever seen this species with food in its beak. Pretty cool, at least it seems to me. 

Red-tailed Hawk

This was my second day in a row at Colliers Mills. Yesterday was one of the rare days that I missed the Red-headed Woodpecker, but then, I didn't look until late in the morning. I spent a lot of time the last two days scoping the wetlands of Borden's Mill Branch, which is a good spot for shorebirds. Scott had told me that he'd had a Long-billed Dowitcher there and since I've never had an LBDO at Colliers, I wanted to add it to my patch list. Unfortunately, I couldn't find it over the two days, but I did get Pectoral Sandpipers (rare for the date), lots of Killdeers, and both yellowlegs, as well as today, a big flock of Rusty Blackbirds feeding on the mudflats. When everything got up and flew off, I looked around and saw a big lump in a leafless tree which resolved itself into a Red-tailed Hawk. That's explains it.

I've also been flushing up can't count 'em Ring-necked Pheasants there. I don't like to anthropomorphize, but I feel bad for them. They look perplexed standing on the path near the Police Shooting Range--bred to be shot and yet somehow still here.

34 species
Canada Goose  8
Wood Duck  7
Green-winged Teal  2     Borden’s Mill Branch wetlands
Ring-necked Pheasant  2      Hens
Killdeer  25
Lesser Yellowlegs  1
Greater Yellowlegs  2
Pectoral Sandpiper  2     
Turkey Vulture  4
Red-tailed Hawk  2
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker  1     East side of Colliers Mill Lake
Red-headed Woodpecker  1
Red-bellied Woodpecker  8
Blue Jay  10
American Crow  2
Carolina Chickadee  3
Tufted Titmouse  1
Golden-crowned Kinglet  1
White-breasted Nuthatch  2
Carolina Wren  2
European Starling  25
Eastern Bluebird  6
Hermit Thrush  1
American Robin  100
House Finch  5
American Goldfinch  2
Dark-eyed Junco  10
White-throated Sparrow  1
Savannah Sparrow  1
Song Sparrow  8
Red-winged Blackbird  12
Rusty Blackbird  24     Exact count of those on mudflats

Yellow-rumped Warbler   15

Northern Cardinal   1

Ring-necked Pheasants--"They can't see us here!"