Picid in Focus: Pale-billed Woodpecker

Pale-billed Woodpecker (Campephilus guatemalensis). Adult male. February 2012, Tortuguero NP, Costa Rica. This was a roost hole, not a nest-hole, in a busy tourist resort.

Picid in Focus: Scarlet-backed Woodpecker

Scarlet-backed Woodpecker (Veniliornis callonotus, race major). Adult male, November 2012, Bosque de Pomac, Peru.

Picid in Focus: another Northern Sooty Woodpecker

Another shot of Northern Sooty Woodpecker Mulleripicus funebris,race/subspecies funebris. Subic Forest, Luzon, Philippines, January 2015. (Gerard Gorman).

Picid in Focus: Northern Sooty Woodpecker

Northern Sooty Woodpecker Mulleripicus funebris, race/subspecies funebris. Females lack the red face. Subic Forest, Luzon, Philippines, January 2015. (Gerard Gorman).   

Picid in Focus: Philippine Woodpecker

Philippine Woodpecker Dendrocopos maculatus. This is the race validirostris. Also commonly known as Philippine Pygmy Woodpecker and locally as just Pygmy Woodpecker. It is endemic to the Philippines, but is not found on all of the islands. Taken in La Mesa Park, Manila, January 2015 (Gerard Gorman).

Terrestrial Woodpeckers

There are several woodpecker species around the world that tend to forage on the ground and many others that, though essentially arboreal, will also occasionally drop to the ground to feed. Two species, however, are highly terrestrial, hardly ever using trees and seldom actually pecking wood! They are, the Andean Flicker Colaptes rupicola of the high Andes in South America & the Ground Woodpecker Geocolaptes olivaceus of Southern Africa. Here is a close-up of the former: a male of the puna race, in C Peru, November 2012 (Gerard Gorman).