The pileated woodpecker ( PY-lee-ay-tid, PIL-ee-; Dryocopus pileatus) is a large, crow-sized woodpecker with a prominent red crest, white neck stripe, and a mostly black body. This woodpecker is native to North America, where it is the largest confirmed extant woodpecker species and the third-largest extant species of woodpecker in the world, after the great slaty woodpecker and the black woodpecker. It inhabits deciduous forests in eastern North America, the Great Lakes, the boreal forests of Canada, and parts of the Pacific Coast. This woodpecker is primarily an insectivore, eating insects that live in trees; it is famous for making large, nearly rectangular carvings into trees, which are used to extract prey inside the tree or to make a nest. The species has a large range and an increasing population, causing it to be categorized as a species of "least concern" by the IUCN.
Taxonomy
English naturalist Mark Catesby described and illustrated the pileated woodpecker in his book The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands, which was published between 1729 and 1732. Catesby used the English name "The larger red-crested Wood-pecker" and the Latin Picus niger maximus capite rubro. When in 1758 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his Systema Naturae for the tenth edition, he included the pileated woodpecker, coined the binomial name Picus pileatus and cited Catesby's book. The specific epithet pileatus is a Latin word meaning "-capped". The type locality is South Carolina. The pileated woodpecker is now one of six species that the International Ornithological Committee and the Clements taxonomy place in genus Dryocopus. The North American Classification Committee of the American Ornithological Society concurs for the pileated and lineated woodpeckers, the only two of the six that occur in Central and North America. However, BirdLife International's Handbook of the Birds of the World (HBW) places the pileated and several others in genus Hylatomus. The genus Dryocopus was introduced by the German naturalist Friedrich Boie in 1826. Two subspecies of Dryocopus pileatus are recognized:
Northern pileated woodpecker (D. p. abieticola): Outram Bangs observed in 1898 that enough morphological differences existed between the two types of pileated woodpeckers to classify the northern pileated woodpecker as its own subspecies. They are found in southern Canada south through the western, north-central, and northeastern United States. Southern pileated woodpecker (D. p. pileatus): They are found in the Southeastern United States.
Description
Pileated woodpeckers are mainly black with a red crest and have a white line down the sides of the throat. Adult males have a red line from the bill to the throat; in adult females, these are black. They also have white wing feathers that show when in flight. Adults are 40 to 49 cm (16 to 19 in) long, span 66 to 75 cm (26 to 30 in) across the wings, and weigh 225 to 400 g (7.9 to 14.1 oz). The average weight of females and males combined is about 277 g (9.8 oz), with males weighing about 300 g (11 oz) and females weighing about 256 g (9.0 oz) in mean body mass. The wing chord measures 21.4 to 25.3 cm (8.4 to 10.0 in), the tail measures 14.0 to 17.4 cm (5.5 to 6.9 in), the bill is 4.1 to 6.0 cm (1.6 to 2.4 in), and the tarsus measures 3.1 to 3.8 cm (1.2 to 1.5 in). Southern pileated woodpeckers have ebony feathers, less white on the feathers by the wings, and are smaller in overall size compared to their northern counterparts. Northern pileated woodpeckers are larger in wing, tail, and beak size. They also have feathers that are a lighter black with tinges of brown and gray and whiter feathers on their flanks. Juvenile pileated woodpeckers tend to have less curved crests, or "mohawks" as some refer to them. The flight of these birds is strong and direct, but undulates in the way characteristic of woodpeckers. Two species found in the Old World, the white-bellied woodpecker (D. javensis) and black woodpeckers (D. martius), are closely related and occupy the same ecological niche in their respective ranges that the pileated occupies in North America. The only North American birds of similar plumage and size are the ivory-billed woodpecker of the Southeastern United States and Cuba and the related imperial woodpecker of Mexico.
Distribution and habitat The pileated woodpecker's breeding habitat is forested areas across Canada, the eastern United States, and parts of the Pacific Coast. This bird favors mature forests and heavily wooded parks. They specifically prefer mesic habitats with large, mature hardwood trees, often being found in large tracts of forest. However, they also inhabit smaller woodlots as long as they have a scattering of tall trees. These woodlots are known as late-successional forests. The pileated woodpecker population shrank drastically in the 1700s and 1800s due to habitat loss, but they have since made a nice recovery. Pileated woodpeckers are believed to be essential in their habitat for many reasons, such as providing nest cavities for other species due to their tree carvings, controlling some insect populations, and by breaking off bits of dying trees so that they can degrade faster. Pileated woodpeckers mainly eat insects, especially carpenter ants and wood-boring beetle larvae. They are also known to eat fruits, nuts, and berries, including those found on poison ivy.
Behavior
Foraging Pileated woodpeckers often chip out large and roughly rectangular holes in trees while searching out insects, especially ant colonies. They also lap up ants by reaching with their long tongues into crevices. They are self-assured on the vertical surfaces of large trees but can seem awkward while eating fruits and berries on small branches and vines. They may also forage on or near the ground, especially around fallen, dead trees, which can contain a variety of insect life. This foraging technique is especially common after a forest fire, where pileated woodpeckers have been seen to flock to the downed trees in search of insects that tried to take refuge in them. They have also been known to eat poison oak seeds and manzanita fruit. They may also forage around the sides of human homes, cars, and suet-type feeders. Although they are less likely feeder visitors than smaller woodpeckers, pileateds may regularly be attracted to them in areas experiencing harsh winter conditions.
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