These two recent visitors are clearly too large. This blurry picture of the pileated woodpecker was all I could capture. The feeder was swinging madly from the weight and size of this bird. He wasn't sure how to get inside the feeder or how to get at the feed. Then he flew to a nearby tree where I could get some better shots.
He was successful and figured out how to perch sideways and reach in with her beak to get at the seed.
Who needs a suet feeder (which I couldn't do anyway).
It's nice to get something out of the ordinary. I never tire of watching the little birds, but these two were really special to see. You don't really get an idea of the size of the pileated woodpecker and from these photos the downy woodpecker looks larger, but the pileated really is quite a bit larger.
Hopefully they will return though because it is fun to see.
3 comments:
The first time I saw a pileated woodpecker I thought I was seeing things - it was HUGE! In fact, I thought it might have been a wild turkey or something. They are very cool birds.
I call the pileated woodpecker elusive, but obviously not as much as I thought. It has a huge wing span and is impressive in flight as well. Beautiful shots.
md
We get a huge variety of migrating and native birds at Anchovy World Headquarters, although I'm poor it bird identification. There is a big park down the block (Sam Smith) which is known as a migration trap. I guess that means it's a really inviting place for birds that have just flown over the lake on their way north. There are loads of birders with their two and three foot long lenses to be seen in the park each May. At our place, we have a number of tall spruces and a big maple in the back and at times symphonies of birds come to the trees. It's really fantastic. We have a bird house and it is occupied for the first time by a family of sparrows. There must be cardinal nests in the trees somewhere because we see them around all the time. Occasionally we get a woodpecker. Recently I've seen a number of goldfinch. One of these days I'll learn to identify more of them.
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