Picid in Focus: Green-barred Woodpecker

Green-barred Woodpecker Colaptes melanochloros occurs in South America, south of the equator, in parts of Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, Bolivia and Argentina. There is some variety in plumage among the five currently recognized races. This photo of a female (lacks red malar) taken in Buenos Aires, Argentina by Karel Zajicek.

Literature: The Red-cockaded Woodpecker

This full title of this important book by Richard N. Conner, D. Craig Rudolph and Jeffrey R. Walters is The Red-cockaded Woodpecker: Surviving in a Fire-maintained Ecosystem. The authors document the story of this endangered picid, covering just about every angle there is in great detail, from history, evolution, behaviour, ecology, forestry, conservation and the associated politics. All in all, essential reading. Published by University of Texas Press, Austin, USA, in 2001. 

Picid In Focus: Buff-necked Woodpecker male

A nice shot of a male Buff-necked Woodpecker Meiglyptes tukki. Note the red malar area, females lack red. Photographed in Peninsula Malaysia by Tan Choo Eng.  

Literature: Woodpeckers of Eastern North America

This book by the late Lawrence Kilham was first published in 1983 by the Nuttall Ornithological Club, then later re-issued by Dover Publications, New York, in 1992. It is out-of-print but still fairly easy to find. It is a great book by a great observer of woodpeckers. It mainly covers Downy, Hairy, Black-backed, Pileated, Red-headed and Red-bellied Woodpeckers, Yellow-bellied Sapsucker and Northern Flicker, and to a lesser extent Crimson-crested and Pale-billed Woodpeckers. It is fact-filled, the facts mostly established by the author himself over years of devoted observation and study of both wild and captive picids.     

Picid in Focus: Greyish Piculet

Greyish Piculet Picumnus granadensis.This tiny picid (9-10cm in length) is endemic to Andean forests in Colombia. Photo of this female (males have some yellow spotting on the crown) taken in the Cauca Valley by Trevor Ellery of PROAVES

Picid in Focus: Powerful Woodpecker

Male Powerful Woodpecker Campephilus pollens. Female lacks red crown. Photo taken in November 2011 at the Colibri del Sol Reserve, Colombia, by Trevor Ellery of PROAVES