Species: Nuttall’s Woodpecker
Most recent capture date: 6/24/2023
Earliest capture date: 6/5/2022
Age: just over one year old
Sex: male
Notes: This guy was captured with a juvenile Nuttall’s Woodpecker, almost certainly his son.
We keep birds in cloth bags while they wait to be measured: they can move around and even perch on the fabric, fluff their feathers or preen, and the dimness is calming. I was measuring another bird, and this woodpecker was waiting in his bag, when a flicker of movement caught my eye. This bird was sticking his bill out through the small opening of the bag – and then sticking his tongue FAR out and wiggling it! (Woodpecker stick their tongues into holes to spear their insect prey, remember: they’re masters at tongue-stick-outing.)