Sunday, we canceled our planned activities and spent the whole day indoors because of an ice storm. Even though we didn't go out, once again we enjoyed the show the birds and critters provided. Along about the middle of the afternoon, what did to my wondering eyes appear? A pileated woodpecker!
She was noshing on a suet cake with all of her beauty and grandeur. Although we see other woodpeckers in abundance, we only see a pileated one about once or twice a year. I was excited to say the least.
Here are a few things I saw this week
during a Second Look.
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| Sunday morning began with snow and turned to sleet and freezing rain in the afternoon. |
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| We always see plenty of juncos around the area of feeder. |
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| But what we hadn't noticed until last weekend was the huge littering of sunflower seed shells under the patio table. Apparently, the juncos have been getting seeds from the feeder and going under the table to eat them. |
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| The suet disappears a lot faster when the squirrels are eating than when the birds are. |
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| On the left is the pileated woodpecker that visited. As soon as she left, a male downy woodpecker (right) flew in. Downy woodpeckers are the most common kind we see at the feeder. Notice how much bigger the pileated one is. |
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| This is the pileated taking off just before the downy flew in. The pileateds are known for the white under their wings which is very evident here. I also find it interesting that, even with that big wing flap, her toes are still anchored to the feeder. |
Your pileated woodpecker is pretty! Last winter we ended up with voles gobbling up the dropped seeds under the birdfeeder. They were like whack-a-mole--they would pop up and back down before you had a chance to really take a look at them. They were troublesome creatures in our garden last summer, too. Crazy how some years you get different critters and birds.
ReplyDeleteIce storms are pretty, but ... not fun to drive on and worrisome for power outages. Sounds like you did the smart thing and hunkered down!
We haven't had many problems from voles in our yard, but we occasionally find one inside. Too bad the voles were so troublesome because it sounds like it would have been really fun to watch them under the feeder.
DeleteWow... that's pretty cool! So I have a stupid question, what on earth is suet, and why do you feed it to birds?
ReplyDeleteSuet is beef fat and provides a high energy source of food for birds. It is preferred by birds that eat insects.
DeleteOh... for birds that eat insects! Now I get it. I guess I was laboring under the misconception that all birds were vegetarians - you know, birdseed and all... But now that I think about it, of course they eat "meat" in the form of worms and insects. Thank you for enlightening me!
DeleteSquirrels sure do find ways of getting to the bird food, but I am no longer surprised by which animals appreciate my efforts to feed birds after witnessing our groundhog climbing the feeder and enjoying a meal last summer. It's been years since I've seen a pileated woodpecker, we get a lot of the downy variety though.
ReplyDeleteWow, that must of been something to see the lumbering groundhog climbing the bird feeder. Although I will say that I have seen them move pretty fast.
DeleteI love pileated woodpeckers. We had one in our yard for several years, but have not seen it this year at all. Hope he just moved to a different tree. Beautiful photos again!
ReplyDeleteApparently, pileateds really like carpenter ants. I'm taking the fact that we don't see them often to mean that we don't have good ants for them to eat. (I hope.) Not that they're shy.
DeleteShe's beautiful!
ReplyDeleteI always think of these kind of woodpeckers as "he" because that's the kind that Woody Woodpecker is. But she is beautiful.
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