Northern Flicker, Colaptes Auratus

Day 115: Aside from the charming polka-dot costume, Colaptes auratus (Northern Flicker) is quite the acrobat. Utilizing his tail to form a third tripod point in conjunction with his feet, he is able to stabilize himself and get better leverage for pecking. Note that I have used a masculine pronoun. Males of the Red-Shafted race (Colaptes auratus cafer) sport a dashing red "moustache." That said, where the ranges of Red-Shafted and Yellow-Shafted overlap as they do in my area, the facial markings may vary. In flight, the two races can be distinguished more readily as their respective colours are revealed. The flight pattern is a distinctive repetition of "flap-flap-flap, glide" as the bird "flickers" from one perch to another.

Polka-Dot 'Pecker

Day 26: This is a Polka-Dot 'Pecker. You can call it a Northern Flicker if you want to be entirely accurate or a Red-Shafted Flicker if you have an emotional attachment to the field guides you used when you were a novice birder fifty years ago, but Colaptes auratus cafer is unquestionably a Polka-Dot 'Pecker in my book. Cornell's website will tell you a lot about their life history, and mine seem determined to disprove some of their data, particularly the part where it says, "Flickers don't habitually visit bird feeders." Speaking from many years of observation of them here, I can assure you that a Flicker doesn't just visit a feeder; it occupies it, leaving no room for anybody else to squeeze in. Even the Steller's Jays, not quite as large but certainly more assertive, will not attempt to budge a Polka-Dot 'Pecker out of the box when it's gobbling down black-oil seed. They also enjoy suet blocks, and a solitary Flickeer can work its way through one in the space of two or three days. This young lady was cleaning up after the crows' breakfast of dog kibble, laying her face tightly against the board in order to get the last morsels. You might also be interested to learn that a Flicker's tongue can be extended two inches beyond the tip of the beak in order to slurp up tasty bugs, and that when their young are 17 days old, they begin clinging to the sides of the nesting cavity rather than resting on its floor. Flickers are amazingly agile, and use their tails to brace themselves against tree trunks and other vertical surfaces. Cornell will also tell you that Northern Flickers are decreasing in number and are listed as a "Common Bird in Steep Decline," so despite the occasional awakening to the sound of drilling in my carport, I love having them here.

Northern Flicker, Colaptes Auratus

Day 170: Well! This portends a crop of little baby Flickers in the future! These photos were taken just two days apart, and I'm not sure which bird has taken to drumming on the ridgepole of my house (might be either or both), a fact which both annoys and amuses me. I love my Flickers, but when the house starts rattling, I step out the door, clap my hands and speak loudly when I say, "Get offa there, you pecker!" It usually works, but occasionally the guilty party will just give me the eye and return to drilling. At that point, my voice goes from "loud" to "shout," and my clapping becomes insistent. And, as you might have expected, the bird flies off, only to return before I can close the door behind me.

So...how do you tell a male Northern Flicker from a female? The male sports a moustache! I've zoomed in on the faces here to show Mr. Flicker's red "mo," a marking absent in the female. The local residents are the Red-Shafted race, although I've seen some intergrades with Yellow-Shafted here as well. In the Yellow-Shafted race, the male's moustache is black and he wears a red patch at the back of his head.

Northern Flicker, Red-Shafted Race

Day 72: Once considered two separate species, Northern Flickers are now believed to be two different races within the same species, Colaptes auratus. The Red-Shafted version (C. auratus cafer) occurs in the western part of the country and the Yellow-Shafted (C. auratus auratus) occurs in the east. Occasional intergrades are seen along the line where the ranges meet and in fact, one showed up in my yard last year displaying the head colouration of a Yellow-Shafted along with distinctive red feather shafts. The pure form of Red-Shafted has a grey face and brown crown, whereas in the Yellow-Shafted, it is reversed (tan face, grey crown). Male Yellow-Shafts wear a black moustache (as did my intergrade) while Red-Shafted's "mo" is red. The flight pattern is the same for both races and is what gives the species its name: the wingbeats are struck in a repeating "flick-flick-flick (glide), flick-flick-flick (glide)" which causes the bird to dip in the air like the loops in a Christmas swag. You might think that Flicker's faddish polka-dot jacket would make the species an easy target for predators, but in fact it provides very effective camouflage, breaking up the bird's silhouette by imitating areas of light and shadow such as would be cast by branches with or without foliage. Flickers often feed hanging upside down, using their tail to brace against a limb for stability and to provide greater power to the thrusts of their beaks. Members of the greater family of Woodpeckers, Flickers drill with a slow, even "tap-tap-tap" rather than rapid jackhammer rapping.

The Acrobat

Day 111: Colaptes auratus cafer (Red-Shafted/Northern Flicker) knows how to strike a balance. This handsome "woodpecker" uses its tail in a manner Olympic gymnasts could rightfully envy. Not only does it employ it as a counterweight, but also for leverage. Here at one of my feeders, Flicker executes a yoga-style "upward dog" in order to peck at a suet cake, using the stiff tail to push against the base of the box. This action lessens the amount of grip needed by its talons, and the bird can dine at leisure. "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction." Flicker beat Newton to the punch by centuries!