1 Day 1 World Project: 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm – Woodpecker Ninjas
When I was out walking in the woods today, I heard a lot of birds scolding and squawking. In the past, following the fuss has led me to sightings of snakes, hawks, and owls, so I went to check it out.
I was surprised to see six red-headed woodpeckers creating the noise. They were flying at each other and chasing each other around the trunk of a dead pine tree.
Every now and then everything would calm down – then one would go to the very top of the tree and start drumming, and someone would come flying at him, and the whole thing would start again.
I have seen red-headed woodpeckers here, but usually just once or twice a year, not nearly as often as I see red-bellied woodpeckers or even pileateds. And I usually see just one or two. I don’t know why these were chasing each other, but it was all they cared about – I took pictures for over an hour and they never seemed to notice me.
I love the stark look of the dead pine tree in these pictures – it made me think of the Old West, with the woodpeckers as gunslingers defending their one-horse town.
Incidentally, I have already missed a week of 1 Day 1 World – I didn’t read the instructions carefully enough! There is only one week assigned to each hour of the day, not two. So I missed the 1 pm to 2 pm hour. For me, that doesn’t matter so much – my day is not highly scheduled. But I hope to participate for the rest of the project. If you would like to participate too, here’s where you can find out more!
What great shots! We have a lot of sapsuckers that sound like woodpeckers but don’t look as interesting. 🙂
Sapsuckers just show up here every so often, I guess as they are migrating through. I got a lot of good pictures of a juvenile sapsucker once – it was intent on its work on a tree and didn’t seem to care that I was only about 10 feet away! But other than that, I haven’t seen them much.
That would be fun to see. We’ve seen a few red-headeds this spring, which has been a treat for us. Also there have been more Baltimore orioles and rose-breasted grosbeaks than usual. I’ve never seen a pileated, but we do have lots of hairy, downy, and red-bellied woodpeckers in our trees. Never at a loss for woodpeckers around here!
Thanks for the pix.
We have downy and red-bellied too, but no hairy woodpeckers! We had a drought in 2011 that killed so many trees, and at least that was beneficial for the woodpeckers.
Great photos!!!!! The red-headed variety is very commonly seen around our place and ‘attacking’ all our power poles!!!! LOL!
I just read that the fact that red-headed woodpeckers will nest in power poles is one thing that is probably causing a decline in their population – the creosote in the poles is bad for the nestlings. You’d think they’d get a headache from the fumes! But I see the red-bellied ones on power poles here too. Fortunately I have more dead trees than power poles! 🙂
LOL!!!!
Great capture! I love the slide show! I’ll put out mine later today 🙂
Amazing photo! Beautiful birds.
Thanks! I just kept clicking away – it was too bright outside for me to see what I was getting, but I hoped that if I took a lot of pictures, some would be good.
so gorgeous! thanks for the post!
Thanks! I was happy to get so close and get some shots without branches in them!
great pictures. We have a woodpecker here with just a dab of red on the back of his head. What kind is it?
If it is small, and mostly black and white, it is probably a downy woodpecker.
How amazing! Great to see you in the project, I am having fun hopping around the blogs to see what everyone else is up to.
Jude xx
I am looking forward to doing that, maybe Sunday if we have a quiet day around here. I just want to sit with a refreshing beverage and blog-hop for hours. Thanks for stopping by!
The woodpeckers have beuatiful colours over there in Texas. I often hear them when walking in the woods but it is not often that one sees them.
I usually don’t see them too often either, or just one or two at a time. It was rare to see six at once, so it seemed like a good picture for the project. Thanks for stopping by!
Pingback: 1 Day 1 World Project: 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm | Northwest Frame of Mind
Great shots! 🙂 I didn’t get around to everybody who was taking part- sorry! Nice to meet you, belatedly.
I didn’t get to everyone every week myself. But I have been enjoying your posts and all your wonderful walks!