Focus on Nature

FOCUS NATURE THE PARSIMONIOUS ACORN WOODPECKER

It's a sociable time, prime birding season, at the Santa Rita Nature Resort in Madera Canyon south of Tucson. From mid-March through September, bird-watchers from throughout the U.S. and all the world's continents gather to observe birds drawn to feeding stations in the small oak-juniper grove fronting the cabins in the Santa Rita Mountains.

Some guests circle the "bird court" with camera and tripod; others content themselves with the only tools a birdwatcher really needs: binoculars and patience. Conversation is noticeably scarce. But pulled together by their passion for birds, there's an instant, unspoken camaraderie among visitors, and most are at ease with first names upon meeting.

On a sunny, early April afternoon, I've met friends here to watch one of the more sociable of birds: the acorn woodpecker.

Large, noisy creatures, woodpeckers as a class are entertaining to watch. I'm amused by the antics of Gila woodpeckers near my desert home, which have taken lately to hammering away at strands of red chilies hung on my front porch. Not surprising. Curious and bold, woodpeckers experience the world by banging away at it. But actually to eat the chili seeds! Their digestive tracts must be composed of cast iron.

Today, though, it's acorn woodpeckers I've come to see. True to their name, these mountain birds harvest acorns and hoard them in tight holes bored into dead trees, fence posts, telephone poles, clapboard anything woody that's handy.

The siding on one of the resort cabins is pocked with holes, some stuffed with acorns. With some effort, I manage to pry loose a nut with my pocketknife; a woodpecker's stout beak and strong neck are better tools for the job.

Medium size among Picidae, the family that includes 210 woodpeckers worldwide, acorn woodpeckers are not quite as big as robins. Males and females, no different in size, are distinguished by color pattern. Above its bill the male has a white patch and a red crown; the female has a white patch, a line of black, then the red crown.

Acorn woodpeckers live in colonies in which all members apparently share in excavating holes, building nests, incubating eggs, and rearing the young.

Although named for their habit of gathering acorns, these woodpeckers also go after agricultural crops such as walnuts and pecans. But they seem to feed mostly on insects, darting from cover like flycatchers to snatch their prey on the wing. In fact, some wildlife biologists believe the birds crack nutshells only to get at insect larvae inside, that nutmeats are emergency food.

Today, in Madera Canyon, the acorn woodpeckers alert us to their coming to feed by calling clamorously among the oaks and junipers. For my money, at least, none of the bird books get that call phonetically accurate. And except to describe it as a sort of "beeping jeer," I won't try. You have to hear it.

Furtive at first, they seem unfazed by our presence once they start to feed. Their favorite target is a gloppy mix of suet and birdseed packed in a metal cage suspended by a thin wire. Lots of birds go for the suet ball, but the acorn woodpeckers have an advantage: tree clingers extraordinaire, they hang upside down beneath the cage to peck out tasty seeds for which other birds can only wish.